Asian Scientist (Sep. 9, 2013) – Scientists in Singapore have discovered an unusual gene that controls the generation of neurons. The finding will be crucial in providing insights for understanding brain diseases such as Alzheimer’s disease.
The birth of neurons in the brain (known as neurogenesis) is a process that requires exquisite control of hundreds of genes. The expression of these genes is controlled by regulatory networks, usually involving proteins, which play critical roles in establishing and maintaining the nervous system.
In their study, published in Molecular Cell, the researchers discovered that RMST is a key component of a gene regulatory network which controls the birth of new neurons.
However, the RMST gene does not encode a protein. Rather, it is an atypical, long non-coding RNA (lncRNA for short; pronounced as “link RNA”).
This means that the RMST RNA molecule does not produce a protein to handle the regulatory process. Instead, it acts directly as a regulatory mechanism.
The discovery of how RMST works within a gene regulatory network not only sheds light on the process of neurogenesis, but also generates new insight into how lncRNA works together with protein components to regulate the important biological processes of gene expression.
“There is now great excitement about the revelation that RNA is more than just a messenger carrying genetic information that encodes for proteins. New classes of RNA, called long non-coding RNAs (lncRNA), have been discovered, which are capable of unanticipated functional diversity,” said Professor Lawrence Stanton, the senior author of the study.
“However, systematic functional investigations of exactly what, and how, lncRNAs do in our cells remain scant. Our study paves the way for understanding a crucial role played by a lncRNA in human neurons.”
The article can be found at: Ng et al. (2013) The Long Noncoding RNA RMST Interacts With SOX2 To Regulate Neurogenesis.
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Source: A*STAR; Photo: Liz Henry/Flickr/CC.
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