Genome complexity: ENCODE shows RNA editing (Introduction)

by David Turell , Wednesday, July 29, 2020, 21:08 (1359 days ago) @ David Turell

More useful parts of the genome as junk disappears:

https://phys.org/news/2020-07-encode-consortium-rna-sequences-involved.html

"The human genome contains about 20,000 protein-coding genes, but the coding parts of our genes account for only about 2 percent of the entire genome. For the past two decades, scientists have been trying to find out what the other 98 percent is doing.

"A research consortium known as ENCODE (Encyclopedia of DNA Elements) has made significant progress toward that goal, identifying many genome locations that bind to regulatory proteins, helping to control which genes get turned on or off. In a new study that is also part of ENCODE, researchers have now identified many additional sites that code for RNA molecules that are likely to influence gene expression.

"These RNA sequences do not get translated into proteins, but act in a variety of ways to control how much protein is made from protein-coding genes. The research team, which includes scientists from MIT and several other institutions, made use of RNA-binding proteins to help them locate and assign possible functions to tens of thousands of sequences of the genome.

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"Much of the ENCODE project has thus far relied on detecting regulatory sequences of DNA using a technique called ChIP-seq. This technique allows researchers to identify DNA sites that are bound to DNA-binding proteins such as transcription factors, helping to determine the functions of those DNA sequences.

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"...the RNA team relied on a technique known as eCLIP, which uses ultraviolet light to cross-link RNA molecules with RNA-binding proteins (RBPs) inside cells. Researchers then isolate specific RBPs using antibodies and sequence the RNAs they were bound to.

"RBPs have many different functions—some are splicing factors, which help to cut out sections of protein-coding messenger RNA, while others terminate transcription, enhance protein translation, break down RNA after translation, or guide RNA to a specific location in the cell. Determining the RNA sequences that are bound to RBPs can help to reveal information about the function of those RNA molecules.

"'RBP binding sites are candidate functional elements in the transcriptome," Burge says. "'However, not all sites of binding have a function, so then you need to complement that with other types of assays to assess function."

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"Overall, the researchers were able to study about 350 of the 1,500 known human RBPs, using one or more of these techniques per protein. RNA splicing factors often have different activity depending on where they bind in a transcript, for example activating splicing when they bind at one end of an intron and repressing it when they bind the other end. Combining the data from these techniques allowed the researchers to produce an "atlas" of maps describing how each RBP's activity depends on its binding location.

"'Why they activate in one location and repress when they bind to another location is a longstanding puzzle," Burge says. "But having this set of maps may help researchers to figure out what protein features are associated with each pattern of activity."

Comment: the genome is like a huge onion, and this shows another layer of understanding peeled away. How so few genes make a complex human.