Introduction

Large noncoding RNAs are emerging as an important component in cellular regulation. Considerable evidence indicates that these transcripts act directly as functional RNAs rather than through an encoded protein product. However, a recent study of ribosome occupancy reported that many large intergenic ncRNAs (lincRNAs) are bound by ribosomes, raising the possibility that they are translated into proteins. Here, we show that classical noncoding RNAs and 5' UTRs show the same ribosome occupancy as lincRNAs, demonstrating that ribosome occupancy alone is not sufficient to classify transcripts as coding or noncoding. Instead, we define a metric based on the known property of translation whereby translating ribosomes are released upon encountering a bona fide stop codon. We show that this metric accurately discriminates between protein-coding transcripts and all classes of known noncoding transcripts, including lincRNAs. Taken together, these results argue that the large majority of lincRNAs do not function through encoded proteins.

Publications

  1. Ribosome profiling provides evidence that large noncoding RNAs do not encode proteins.
    Cite this
    Guttman M, Russell P, Ingolia NT, Weissman JS, Lander ES, 2013-07-01 - Cell

Credits

  1. Mitchell Guttman
    Developer

    -, Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, United States of America

  2. Pamela Russell
    Developer

  3. Nicholas T Ingolia
    Developer

  4. Jonathan S Weissman
    Developer

  5. Eric S Lander
    Investigator

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Summary
AccessionBT006535
Tool TypeApplication
Category
PlatformsLinux/Unix
Technologies
User InterfaceTerminal Command Line
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Submitted ByEric S Lander