Control of RNase E-mediated RNA degradation by 5′-terminal base pairing in E. coil
- 1 December 1992
- journal article
- Published by Springer Nature in Nature
- Vol. 360 (6403), 488-491
- https://doi.org/10.1038/360488a0
Abstract
Despite the variety of messenger RNA half-lives in bacteria (0.5-30 min in Escherichia coli) and their importance in controlling gene expression, their molecular basis remains obscure. The lifetime of an entire mRNA molecule can be determined by features near its 5' end, but no 5' exoribonuclease has been identified in any prokaryotic organism. A mutation that inactivates E. coli RNase E also increases the average lifetime of bulk E. coli mRNA and of many individual messages, suggesting that cleavage by this endonuclease may be the rate-determining step in the degradation of most mRNAs in E. coli. We have investigated the substrate preference of RNase E in E. coli by using variants of RNA I, a small untranslated RNA whose swift degradation in vivo is initiated by RNase E cleavage at an internal site. We report here that RNase E has an unprecedented substrate specificity for an endoribonuclease, as it preferentially cleaves RNAs that have several unpaired nucleotides at the 5' end. The sensitivity of RNase E to 5'-terminal base pairing may explain how determinants near the 5' end can control rates of mRNA decay in bacteria.Keywords
This publication has 33 references indexed in Scilit:
- The Ams (altered mRNA stability) protein and ribonuclease E are encoded by the same structural gene of Escherichia coli.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 1991
- RNase E, an endoribonuclease, has a general role in the chemical decay of Escherichia coli mRNA: evidence that rne and ams are the same genetic locusMolecular Microbiology, 1990
- Ribonucleases: Diversity and RegulationPublished by Springer Nature ,1990
- Erythromycin-induced stabilization of ermA messenger RNA in Staphylococcus aureus and Bacillus subtilisJournal of Molecular Biology, 1988
- Induced mRNA stability in Bacillus subtilis.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 1987
- The stability of E. coli gene transcripts is dependent on determinants localized to specific mRNA segmentsCell, 1986
- The stability of bacteriophage T4 gene 32 mRNA: A 5′ leader sequence that can stabilize mRNA transcriptsCell, 1985
- Purification and properties of ribonuclelase E, an RNA-processing enzyme from Escherichia coliBiochimica et Biophysica Acta (BBA) - Protein Structure and Molecular Enzymology, 1983
- A conditional lethal mutation in an Escherichia coli strain with a longer chemical lifetime of messenger RNAJournal of Molecular Biology, 1979
- Differential stability of trp messenger RNA synthesized originating at the trp promoter and pL promoter of lambda trp phageJournal of Molecular Biology, 1975