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UV Irradiation Induces a Non-coding RNA that Functionally Opposes the Protein Encoded by the Same Gene

  • Laura Williamson
  • , Marco Saponaro
  • , Stefan Boeing
  • , Philip East
  • , Richard Mitter
  • , Theodoros Kantidakis
  • , Gavin P. Kelly
  • , Anna Lobley
  • , Jane Walker
  • , Bradley Spencer-Dene
  • , Michael Howell
  • , Aengus Stewart
  • , Jesper Q. Svejstrup*
  • *Corresponding author for this work
  • The Francis Crick Institute
  • University College Birmingham
  • Mechanisms of Transcription Laboratory

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

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Abstract

The transcription-related DNA damage response was analyzed on a genome-wide scale with great spatial and temporal resolution. Upon UV irradiation, a slowdown of transcript elongation and restriction of gene activity to the promoter-proximal ∼25 kb is observed. This is associated with a shift from expression of long mRNAs to shorter isoforms, incorporating alternative last exons (ALEs) that are more proximal to the transcription start site. Notably, this includes a shift from a protein-coding ASCC3 mRNA to a shorter ALE isoform of which the RNA, rather than an encoded protein, is critical for the eventual recovery of transcription. The non-coding ASCC3 isoform counteracts the function of the protein-coding isoform, indicating crosstalk between them. Thus, the ASCC3 gene expresses both coding and non-coding transcript isoforms with opposite effects on transcription recovery after UV-induced DNA damage.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)843-855.e13
JournalCell
Volume168
Issue number5
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 23 Feb 2017

Bibliographical note

© 2017 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Inc. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).

Funding

This work was supported by the Francis Crick Institute (that receives its core funding from Cancer Research UK [FC001166], the UK Medical Research Council [FC001166], and the Wellcome Trust [FC001166]) and by grants from the European Research Council, Agreements 693327 (TRANSDAM) and 268797 (TRANSINTEG). We thank The Francis Crick Advanced Sequencing Facility, the Cell Services Facility, the High-Throughput Genomics Group at the Wellcome Trust Centre for Human Genetics (funded by Wellcome Trust grant 090532/Z/09/Z) for expression array analysis, and Yang Shi for the kind gift of ASCC3 antibody. Peter Verrijzer and members of the Svejstrup laboratory are thanked for comments on the manuscript.

Keywords

  • alternative last exon splicing
  • ASCC3
  • DNA damage response
  • lncRNA
  • non-coding RNA
  • RNA polymerase II
  • transcript elongation
  • UV-irradiation

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