Piwi and piRNAs Act Upstream of an Endogenous siRNA Pathway to Suppress Tc3 Transposon Mobility in the Caenorhabditis elegans Germline

jerry submitted, created time 5 months 3 weeks (www.molecule.org)

The Piwi proteins of the Argonaute superfamily are required for normal germline development in Drosophila, zebrafish, and mice and associate with 24–30 nucleotide RNAs termed piRNAs. They identified a class of 21 nucleotide RNAs, previously named 21U-RNAs, as the piRNAs of C. elegans. Piwi and piRNA expression is restricted to the male and female germline and independent of many proteins in other small-RNA pathways, including DCR-1. They showed that Piwi was specifically required to silence Tc3, but not other Tc/mariner DNA transposons

1 comment | Blog It | Email It | Keywords: piwi-interacting RNAs (piRNAs) Piwi proteins small interfering RNA (siRNA) germline

Gene silencing made practical: siRNA used to treat neurogenerative disorders in the lab

Darkfrog submitted, created time 7 months 2 days (www.jbc.org)

This abstract is about as easy to read as sixteenth-century tax law, but here's the gist: Human neurogenerative disorders, like Huntington's, Parkinson's, Alzheimer's and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (Lou Gherig's disease) are all caused or exacerbated by the expression of mutant genes. If we switch off the genes--or at least keep them from producing proteins--then the patients might get better. One way to switch off a gene is to inject the cell with a siRNA (short interfering RNA) that complements the gene's product mRNA. This is called gene silencing

2 comments | Blog It | Email It | Keywords: gene silencing Huntingtons disease Alzheimers disease Parkinsons alzheimers huntingtons amyotrophic lateral sclerosis small interfering RNA (siRNA) lou gherig's disease ALS

RNA Interference against MDR1 but not MRP1 Reverses Drug Resistance in Human Small-Cell Lung Cancer Cells

Carbodiimide-mediated cross-linking of RNA to nylon membranes improves the detection of siRNA, miRNA and piRNA by northern blot

diggman submitted, created time 1 year 8 months (nar.oxfordjournals.org)

The ability to synthesize custom de novo DNA constructs rapidly, accurately and inexpensively is highly desired by researchers, as synthetic genes and longer DNA constructs are enabling to numerous powerful applications in both traditional molecular biology and the emerging field of synthetic biology. Here the scientist discovered that using the soluble carbodiimide, EDC, to cross-link RNA to nylon membranes greatly improved the detection of small RNA by hybridization

Submit comment | Blog It | Email It | Keywords: small interfering RNA (siRNA) microRNA (miRNA) piwi-interacting RNA (piRNA) Northern blot