Long non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs) are key regulatory molecules, but unlike with other RNAs, the direct link between their tertiary structure motifs and their function has proven elusive. An international team led by researchers at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory, Grenoble (EMBL) report structural and functional studies of human maternally expressed gene 3 (MEG3), a tumor suppressor lncRNA that modulates the ...
Read More »Basic biology and therapeutic implications of lncRNA
Long non-coding RNAs (lncRNA), a class of non-coding RNA molecules recently identified largely due to the efforts of FANTOM, and later GENCODE and ENCODE consortia, have been a subject of intense investigation in the past decade. Extensive efforts to get deeper understanding of lncRNA biology have yielded evidence of their diverse structural and regulatory roles in protecting chromosome integrity, maintaining ...
Read More »Long Noncoding RNAs in Imprinting and X Chromosome Inactivation
The field of long noncoding RNA (lncRNA) research has been rapidly advancing in recent years. Technological advancements and deep-sequencing of the transcriptome have facilitated the identification of numerous new lncRNAs, many with unusual properties, however, the function of most of these molecules is still largely unknown. Some evidence suggests that several of these lncRNAs may regulate their own transcription in ...
Read More »X-Inactivation, Imprinting, and Long Noncoding RNAs in Health and Disease
X chromosome inactivation and genomic imprinting are classic epigenetic processes that cause disease when not appropriately regulated in mammals. Whereas X chromosome inactivation evolved to solve the problem of gene dosage, the purpose of genomic imprinting remains controversial. Nevertheless, the two phenomena are united by allelic control of large gene clusters, such that only one copy of a gene is ...
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