The impact of miRNA target sites in coding sequences and in 3'UTRs.

ABSTRACT: Animal miRNAs are a large class of small regulatory RNAs that are known to directly and negatively regulate the expression of a large fraction of all protein encoding genes. The identification and characterization of miRNA targets is thus a fundamental problem in biology. miRNAs regulate target genes by binding to 3' untranslated regions (3'UTRs) of target mRNAs, and multiple binding sites for the same miRNA in 3'UTRs can strongly enhance the degree of regulation. Recent experiments have demonstrated that a large fraction of miRNA binding sites reside in coding sequences. Overall, miRNA binding sites in coding regions were shown to mediate smaller regulation than 3'UTR binding. However, possible interactions between target sites in coding sequences and 3'UTRs have not been studied. Using t

SUBMITTER: Fang Z 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3062573 | biostudies-literature | 2011 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature