Rinsho Shinkeigaku (Clinical Neurology)

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The world of functional RNA

Hiromi Okada, Ph.D.1) and Yoshihide Hayashizaki, M.D., Ph.D.1)

1)Preventive Medicine and Diagnosis Innovation Program, RIKEN Research Cluster for Innovation

The development of next-generation sequences has brought not only high-throughput sequencing but also new possibilities for various kinds of analysis methods of genetic information. Dr. Hayashizaki et al. developed new technologies to construct the full-length cDNA library and applied them to high-throughput sequencing technologies for large-scale transcriptome analysis. These analysis results overturned the conventional assumption the 2% of the genome is transcribed by showing that 70% or more of the genome is transcribed as RNA through FANTOM activities which was founded in 2000 on their initiative. Further, the existence of 23,000 non-protein coding RNAs was confirmed. These new findings redefine the central dogma into a new picture containing new interaction cascade and the unexpected complexity of combined omics. The neo central dogma shows that there are three types of final products derived from genes; long ncRNA, small ncRNA, and protein. They play essential roles by forming complexes with each other to maintain life. Long ncRNA and small ncRNA play a role as a ligand with sequence information. Long ncRNA and protein play a role as a functional molecule. Here, I would like to introduce the neo central dogma concept and some of the mechanisms of ncRNAs.
Full Text of this Article in Japanese PDF (1914K)

(CLINICA NEUROL, 53: 957|961, 2013)
key words: non-coding RNA, long non-coding RNA, sense-antisense RNA, transcriptome analysis

(Received: 31-May-13)