Identifi cation of micro RNAs in two species of tomato,Solanum lycopersicum and Solanum habrochaites,by deep sequencing

Micro RNAs(mi RNAs) are ~21 nucleotide(nt), endogenous RNAs that regulate gene expression in plants. Increasing evidence suggests that mi RNAs play an important role in species-specific development in plants. However, the detailed mi RNA profile divergence has not been performed among tomato species. In this study, the small RNA(s RNA) profiles of Solanum lycopersicum cultivar 9706 and Solanum habrochaites species PI 134417 were obtained by deep sequencing. Sixty-three known mi RNA families were identified from these two species, of which 39 were common. Further mi RNA profile comparison showed that 24 known non-conserved mi RNA families were species-specific between these two tomato species. In addition, six conserved mi RNA families displayed an apparent divergent expression pattern between the two tomato species. Our results suggested that species-specific, non-conserved mi RNAs and divergent expression of conserved mi RNAs might contribute to developmental changes and phenotypic variation between the two tomato species. Twenty new mi RNAs were also identified in S. lycopersicum. This research significantly increases the number of known mi RNA families in tomato and provides the first set of small RNAs in S. habrochaites. It also suggests that mi RNAs have an important role in species-specific plant developmental regulation.     

The eukaryotic genome as an RNA machine

The past few years have revealed that the genomes of all studied eukaryotes are almost entirely transcribed, generating an enormous number of non-protein-coding RNAs (ncRNAs). In parallel, it is increasingly evident that many of these RNAs have regulatory functions. Here, we highlight recent advances that illustrate the diversity of ncRNA control of genome dynamics, cell biology, and developmental programming.     

植物微小RNA（microRNA）研究进展

真核细胞中存在大量的非编码RNA,～22nt的小RNA是其中一类非常重要的调控RNA,主要包括siRNA和miRNA两种类型,二者均由类似RNaseⅢ的核酸内切酶一Dicer加工产生,随后进入沉默复合体抑制靶基因表达。miRNA分子与siRNA类似,但miRNA的前体在基因组上具有独立的转录单位,可自身折叠成发卡结构,其靶基因主要是与器官发生及生长发育相关的转录因子以及调控蛋白。miRNA在生物生长发育的各个时期都扮演着重要的角色,调控许多重要的生物途径,处于基因调控网络的核心位置。     

长片段非编码RNA及其功能研究进展

随着大规模基因组测序的完成,大量的非编码RNA（non-coding RNA,ncRNA）被发现。这些ncRNA能够通过多种遗传机制参与基因表达调控,其中Longnon-coding RNA（lncRNA）是一类转录本长度超过200nt的RNA分子。研究表明,lncRNA参与了基因组印记,剂量补偿效应,表观遗传等多种重要的调控过程。就近年来lncRNA的功能方面研究进展进行综述。     

Translation of the edited mRNA for cytochrome b in trypanosome mitochondria

The type of RNA editing found in the kinetoplast-mitochondria of trypanosomes and related protozoa, involving uridylate insertions and deletions, creates translatable messenger RNAs (mRNAs) out of nonsense pre-edited RNAs by correcting encoded defects that vary from simple frameshifts to large "cryptic" regions. However, any evidence for translation of these mRNAs in the kinetoplast has been missing for decades. We identified a kinetoplast-encoded protein, apocytochrome b, whose mRNA is edited in the 5' region. The determined amino-terminal sequence of the protein coincides with the predicted sequence derived from the edited region, demonstrating that the cognate apocytochrome b mRNA is translated into a functional protein. This finding represents the first direct evidence for a functional translation system in the kinetoplasts.     

Ancient pathways programmed by small RNAs

Double-stranded RNA can now be used in a wide variety of eukaryotes to suppress the expression of virtually any gene, allowing the rapid analysis of that gene's function, a technique known as RNA interference. But how cells use the information in double-stranded RNA to suppress gene expression and why they contain the machinery to do so remain the subjects of intense scrutiny. Current evidence suggests that RNA interference and other "RNA silencing" phenomena reflect an elaborate cellular apparatus that eliminates abundant but defective messenger RNAs and defends against molecular parasites such as transposons and viruses.     

The Release 5.1 annotation of Drosophila melanogaster heterochromatin

The repetitive DNA that constitutes most of the heterochromatic regions of metazoan genomes has hindered the comprehensive analysis of gene content and other functions. We have generated a detailed computational and manual annotation of 24 megabases of heterochromatic sequence in the Release 5 Drosophila melanogaster genome sequence. The heterochromatin contains a minimum of 230 to 254 protein-coding genes, which are conserved in other Drosophilids and more diverged species, as well as 32 pseudogenes and 13 noncoding RNAs. Improved methods revealed that more than 77% of this heterochromatin sequence, including introns and intergenic regions, is composed of fragmented and nested transposable elements and other repeated DNAs. Drosophila heterochromatin contains "islands" of highly conserved genes embedded in these "oceans" of complex repeats, which may require special expression and splicing mechanisms.     

RNAi-mediated transgenic rice resistance to Rice stripe virus

Rice stripe virus(RSV) often causes severe rice yield loss in temperate regions of East Asia. Although the correlation of small interfering RNAs(si RNAs) with transgenic virus resistance of plants using RNA interference(RNAi) is known for decades, no systematical research has been done on the profiling of si RNAs from a genomic scale. Our research is aiming to systematically study the RNAi impact in RSV-resistant transgenic rice, which was generated by introducing an inverted repeat construct that targets RSV nucleocapsid protein(NCP) gene. In this paper, three independent RSV-retsistant transgenic rice lines were generated, their stable integration of the T-DNA fragment and the expression of si RNAs were confirmed by Southern blotting and Northern blotting analyses, and the majority of si RNAs were in lengths of 21, 22, and 24 nucleotides(nt), which have validated a connection between the presence of the RSV NCP homologous si RNAs and the RSV resistance in those transgenic rice lines. In one of these transgenic lines(T4-B1), the T-DNA fragment was found to have been inserted at chromosome 1 of the rice genome, substituting the rice genome fragment from 32 158 773 to 32 158 787 nt. Bioinformatics analysis of small RNA-Seq data on the T4-B1 line also confirmed the large population of NCP-derived si RNAs in transgenic plants, and the RSV-infected library(T4-B1-V) possessed more si RNAs than its mock inoculated libraries(T4-B1-VF), these results indicating the inverted repeat construct and RSV could introduce abundance of si RNAs in transgenic rice. Moreover, a varied expression level of specific si RNAs was found among different segments of the NCP gene template, about 47% of NCP-derived si RNAs reads aligned with the fragment from 594 to 832 nt(239 nt in length) in NCP gene(969 nt in length) in the T4-B1-V, indicating a potential usage of hotspot regions for RNAi silencing in future research. In conclusion, as the first study to address the si RNA profile in RSV-resistant transgenic plant using next generation sequencing(NGS) technique, we confirmed that the massive abundance of si RNA derived from the inverted repeat of NCP is the major reason for RSV-resistance.     

植物转基因抗性策略研究进展

通过转基因技术使植物获得抗病性是控制植物病毒感染的一种重要技术途径。RNA干扰技术的出现为植物转基因抗性策略的研究提供了新思路。植物转基因抗性产生方法主要是通过表达不同的病毒蛋白(外壳蛋白、复制蛋白、运动蛋白及其他病毒蛋白)、RNAs(反义RNA、卫星RNA、缺陷干扰RNA、发夹RNA及人工微小RNA)、非病毒基因(核酸酶、抗病毒蛋白抑制子及植物体)、宿主来源的抗性基因(显性抗性基因和隐性抗性基因)及各种宿主防御反应因子等。介绍了以上几种抗性策略并分析了目前尚存在的问题,以期为植物转基因抗性策略研究的学者提供参考。     

Elucidation of the small RNA component of the transcriptome

Small RNAs play important regulatory roles in most eukaryotes, but only a small proportion of these molecules have been identified. We sequenced more than two million small RNAs from seedlings and the inflorescence of the model plant Arabidopsis thaliana. Known and new microRNAs (miRNAs) were among the most abundant of the nonredundant set of more than 75,000 sequences, whereas more than half represented lower abundance small interfering RNAs (siRNAs) that match repetitive sequences, intergenic regions, and genes. Individual or clusters of highly regulated small RNAs were readily observed. Targets of antisense RNA or miRNA did not appear to be preferentially associated with siRNAs. Many genomic regions previously considered featureless were found to be sites of numerous small RNAs.