Joan Steitz: Leading Ladies in Epigenetics ResearchSeptember 4, 2008In 1967, Joan Argetsinger Steitz received her Ph.D. from Harvard University, where she conducted her doctoral research on RNA bacteriophage in the lab of Dr. James Watson. As a post-doc at Cambridge, Dr. Steitz studied ribosome binding sites in mRNA. In 1970, she joined the faculty at Yale and began her groundbreaking and now famous […]
miRNAs: From worthless junk to evolutionary slam dunkAugust 17, 2008Gone are the days when microRNAs (miRNAs) were relegated to the unimportant “junk heap” of sequences cluttering up the genome. We now know that these tiny, highly conserved non-coding RNAs play important roles in RNA stability and translation by base-pairing with partially complementary sequences in the 3’ untranslated regions (UTRs) of target mRNAs. Moreover, a […]
Ligation Mediated RNA-RNA AnalysisJuly 21, 2008Last week, researchers from the Karolinska Institute and the University of London released data on an innovative approach for studying RNA-RNA interactions. Data supporting the multitude of RNA functions in our cells continues to pour in, but challenges in analyzing the effecting complexes in cellular processes persist, so we tip our hats to this team […]
miRNA Retention and EnhancementJuly 21, 2008miRNAs, the small but mighty inhibitors of complementary mRNA sequences, might be accused of having a Napoleon complex, but they don’t start out life itty-bitty—they are transcribed as long primary miRNAs (pri-miRNAs). Cleavage by the RNase III-like enzyme Drosha in the nucleus releases a ~70-nt stem-loop structure (pre-mRNA), which is further processed by Dicer in […]
Webserver for Aligning Non-Coding RNA Structure-WARJuly 13, 2008Finally a WAR with no conflict. We have to give a big electronic high five to the group from the University of Copenhagen who just introduced a very helpful web utility: WAR-Webserver for aligning structural RNAs is a very handy site that allows you to use the best algorithms for aligning and predicting the consensus […]
Pursuit of the Moving miRNA TargetApril 11, 2008Since 3’ UTRs were found to contain docking sites for miRNAs, labs with computational muscle around the world have been chipping away the target predication dilemma, but like any game, it’s hard to win when you don’t know the rules. It’s even harder when the rules are being rewritten weekly which is why we have […]
RIP it Good: The Rise of Ribonucleicprotein IPApril 5, 2008For years, transcriptional regulation took center stage in studies of gene expression, and the nuances of which transcription factor binds to which DNA sequence under which circumstances dominated the dialogue of molecular biologists. In recent years, a supporting actor has threatened to steal the show: enter, post-transcriptional regulation. The idea that messenger RNA utilization could […]
Espionage, Genetics, and miRNAMarch 12, 2008George Adrian Calin received both his M.D. and Ph.D. degrees at Carol Davila University of Medicine in Bucharest, Romania, where he started cytogenetics work with Dr Dragos Stefanescu. After completing cancer genomics training in Dr. Massimo Negrini’s laboratory at University of Ferrara, Italy, he became a postdoctoral fellow at Kimmel Cancer Center in Philadelphia, PA, […]
