Highly conserved and cis-acting lncRNAs produced from paralogous regions in the center of HOXA and HOXB clusters in the endoderm lineage.

ABSTRACT: Long noncoding RNAs (lncRNAs) have been shown to play important roles in gene regulatory networks acting in early development. There has been rapid turnover of lncRNA loci during vertebrate evolution, with few human lncRNAs conserved beyond mammals. The sequences of these rare deeply conserved lncRNAs are typically not similar to each other. Here, we characterize HOXA-AS3 and HOXB-AS3, lncRNAs produced from the central regions of the HOXA and HOXB clusters. Sequence-similar orthologs of both lncRNAs are found in multiple vertebrate species and there is evident sequence similarity between their promoters, suggesting that the production of these lncRNAs predates the duplication of the HOX clusters at the root of the vertebrate lineage. This conservation extends to similar expression patterns

SUBMITTER: Degani N 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8330917 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Jul

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature