Transcription readthrough is prevalent in healthy human tissues and associated with inherent genomic features.

ABSTRACT: Transcription termination is a crucial step in the production of conforming mRNAs and functional proteins. Under cellular stress conditions, the transcription machinery fails to identify the termination site and continues transcribing beyond gene boundaries, a phenomenon designated as transcription readthrough. However, the prevalence and impact of this phenomenon in healthy human tissues remain unexplored. Here, we assessed transcription readthrough in almost 3000 transcriptome profiles representing 23 human tissues and found that 34% of the expressed protein-coding genes produced readthrough transcripts. The production of readthrough transcripts was restricted in genomic regions with high transcriptional activity and was associated with inefficient splicing and increased chromatin access

SUBMITTER: Caldas P 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC10789751 | biostudies-literature | 2024 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature