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PMID: 17020921 Published · ppublish English Journal Article Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't Review

Alu elements as regulators of gene expression.

Nucleic acids research ·Vol. 34 ·No. 19 ·2006-00-00 ·Pages 5491-7

Häsler J, Strub K

Abstract

Alu elements are the most abundant repetitive elements in the human genome; they emerged 65 million years ago from a 5' to 3' fusion of the 7SL RNA gene and amplified throughout the human genome by retrotransposition to reach the present number of more than one million copies. Over the last years, several lines of evidence demonstrated that these elements modulate gene expression at the post-transcriptional level in at least three independent manners. They have been shown to be involved in alternative splicing, RNA editing and translation regulation. These findings highlight how the genome adapted to these repetitive elements by assigning them important functions in regulation of gene expression. Alu elements should therefore be considered as a large reservoir of potential regulatory functions that have been actively participating in primate evolution.

MeSH Terms
Alu Elements Base Sequence Gene Expression Regulation Molecular Sequence Data Protein Biosynthesis RNA/chemistry RNA Editing RNA Splicing
Chemicals
RNA
Authors & Affiliations
2 authors, click to expand affiliations / ORCID
Häsler Julien
Université de Genève, Katharina Strub, Département de Biologie Cellulaire, 30 quai Ernest Ansermet, 1211 GENEVE 4, Switzerland.
Strub Katharina
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Article Info
Journal
Nucleic acids research
Abbr.
Nucleic Acids Res
ISSN
1362-4962
DOI
10.1093/nar/gkl706
Published
2006-00-00
Epub
2006-00-04
Pages
5491-7
Language
English
Region
England
NLM ID
0411011
PMCID
PMC1636486
Subset
IM
Corrections
ErratumIn
-
External Links
PubMed source DOI: 10.1093/nar/gkl706 PMC Full Text View journal details
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