Poster abstracts

Poster number 84 submitted by Hiroto Kambara

Analysis of the relationship between gene architecture and repeat elements of BORG RNA

Hiroto Kambara (Center for RNA Molecular Biology), Farshad Niazi (Center for RNA Molecular Biology), Bing Zhang (Center for RNA Molecular Biology), Lalith S. Gunawardane (Center for RNA Molecular Biology), Saba Valadkhan (Center for RNA Molecular Biology)

Abstract:
The recent transcriptome analyses have revealed that a large numbers of long non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs) are transcribed from the higher eukaryotic genomes, and that many of them originate within the intergenic region of protein-coding genes. We have identified BORG lncRNA, which plays a crucial role in neuronal differentiation and reprogramming. The mouse BORG RNA is an intergenic transcript, resulting from splicing of two introns from three exons. Analysis of the BORG gene in mouse indicates the presence of several retrotransposon elements within and near the BORG locus. Interestingly, the transcriptional start site of the BORG gene is located within a repeat element. Further, all four exon-intron junctions in the BORG gene fall within repeat elements. Finally, the polyadenylation signal of BORG is also derived from a retrotransposon repeat element. The mature, spliced BORG RNA contains five repeat elements of LTR and SINE subtypes with 40% of nucleotides within BORG derived from repeat elements. Thus, it seems that the evolution of BORG RNA is largely the result of transposition events. Interestingly, these repeat elements seem to be conserved among mammals. However, the role of repeat elements in evolution of long non-coding RNAs in different species remains poorly understood. In this study, we have analyzed the relationship between gene architecture and repeat elements using a database of known mRNA and lncRNAs in human and mouse. The results of this analysis in BORG RNA and other protein-coding and non-coding RNAs will be discussed.

Keywords: Long non-coding RNA