Project description:Synthesis and degradation of cellular constituents must be balanced to maintain cellular homeostasis, especially during adaptation to environmental stress. The role of autophagy in the degradation of proteins and organelles is well-characterized. However, autophagy-mediated RNA degradation in response to stress and the potential preference of specific RNAs to undergo autophagy-mediated degradation have not been examined. In this study, we demonstrate selective mRNA degradation by rapamycin-induced autophagy in yeast. Profiling of mRNAs from the vacuole reveals that subsets of mRNAs, such as those encoding amino acid biosynthesis and ribosomal proteins, are preferentially delivered to the vacuole by autophagy for degradation. We also reveal that autophagy-mediated mRNA degradation is tightly coupled with translation by ribosomes. Genome-wide ribosome profiling suggested a high correspondence between ribosome association and targeting to the vacuole. We propose that autophagy-mediated mRNA degradation is a unique and previously-unappreciated function of autophagy that affords post-transcriptional gene regulation.
Project description:Autophagy is a catabolic membrane trafficking process involved in degradation of cellular constituents through lysosomes, which maintains cell and tissue homeostasis. While much attention has been focused on autophagic turnover of cytoplasmic materials, little is known regarding the role of autophagy in degrading nuclear components. Here we report that autophagy machinery mediates degradation of nuclear lamina in mammalian cells, a process we term laminophagy. The autophagy protein LC3 is present in the nucleus and directly interacts with the nuclear lamina protein Lamin B1, and associates with lamin-associated domains (LADs) on chromatin. This interaction does not downregulate Lamin B1 during starvation, but mediates nuclear lamina degradation upon tumorigenic insults, such as by oncogenic Ras. Laminophagy is achieved by nucleus-to-cytosol transport that delivers Lamin B1 to lysosome for degradation. Inhibiting autophagy or LC3-Lamin B1 interaction prevents oncogenic Ras-induced Lamin B1 loss and delays oncogene-induced cell cycle arrest. Our study unveils a role of autophagy in degrading nuclear materials, and suggests laminophagy as a guarding mechanism protecting cells from tumorigenesis.
Project description:General discard pathways eliminate unprocessed and irregular pre-mRNAs to control the quality of gene expression. In contrast to such general pre-mRNA decay, we describe here a nuclear pre-mRNA degradation pathway that controls the expression of select intron-containing genes. We show that the fission yeast nuclear poly(A)-binding protein, Pab2, and the nuclear exosome subunit, Rrp6, are the main factors involved in this polyadenylation-dependent pre-mRNA degradation pathway. Transcriptome analysis and intron swapping experiments revealed that inefficient splicing is important to dictate susceptibility to Pab2-dependent pre-mRNA decay. We also show that negative splicing regulation can promote the poor splicing efficiency required for this pre-mRNA decay pathway, and in doing so identify a mechanism of cross-regulation between paralogous ribosomal proteins through nuclear pre-mRNA decay. Our findings unveil a layer of regulation in the nucleus in which the turnover of specific pre-mRNAs, besides the turnover of mature mRNAs, is used to control gene expression.
Project description:We measured mRNA levels of two yeast species (S.cerevisiae and S.paradoxus) and their hybrid, at four time-points (0, 20min, 40min, 60min) following transcription arrest using 1,10-Phenantroline (150ug/ml). This data was used to infer mRNA degradation rates of orthologous genes, study the divergence of mRNA degradation rates and the contribution of cis and trans mutations.
Project description:We measured mRNA levels of two yeast species (S.cerevisiae and S.paradoxus) and their hybrid, at four time-points (0, 20min, 40min, 60min) following transcription arrest using 1,10-Phenantroline (150ug/ml). This data was used to infer mRNA degradation rates of orthologous genes, study the divergence of mRNA degradation rates and the contribution of cis and trans mutations. For each of the two biological repeats and each of the four time point, poly(A) mRNAs of the two species was pooled and labeled with cy3 while hybrid poly(A) mRNA was labeled with cy5 and these were hybridized to our custom two-species microarray (Agilent) with four subarrays.
Project description:Autophagy is essential for cellular survival and energy homeostasis under nutrient deprivation. Despite the emerging importance of nuclear events in autophagy regulation, epigenetic control of autophagy gene transcription remains unclear. Here, we identify Jumonji-D3 (JMJD3/KDM6B) histone demethylase as a key epigenetic activator of hepatic autophagy. Upon fasting-induced fibroblast growth factor-21 (FGF21) signaling, JMJD3 epigenetically upregulated global autophagy-network genes, including Tfeb, Atg7, Atgl, and Fgf21, through demethylation of histone H3K27-me3, resulting in autophagy-mediated lipid degradation. Mechanistically, phosphorylation of JMJD3 at Thr-1044 by FGF21 signal-activated PKA increased its nuclear localization and interaction with the nuclear receptor PPARa to transcriptionally activate autophagy. Chronic administration of FGF21 in obese mice improved defective autophagy and hepatosteatosis in a JMJD3-dependent manner. Remarkably, in non-alcoholic fatty liver disease patients, hepatic expression of JMJD3, ATG7, LC3, and bKL were substantially decreased. These findings demonstrate that FGF21-JMJD3 signaling epigenetically links nutrient deprivation with hepatic autophagy and lipid degradation in mammals.
Project description:This SuperSeries is composed of the following subset Series: GSE36341: mRNA degradation in Mycobacterium tuberculosis under aerobic conditions GSE36342: mRNA degradation in Mycobacterium smegmatis under aerobic conditions GSE36343: mRNA degradation in Mycobacterium tuberculosis during cold and hypoxic stress GSE36344: mRNA degradation in Mycobacterium tuberculosis with DosR ectopically induced Refer to individual Series