Nonsense-mediated decay

Nonsense-mediated mRNA decay (NMD) is a

NMD was first described in human cells and in yeast almost simultaneously in 1979. This suggested broad phylogenetic conservation and an important biological role of this intriguing mechanism.[3] NMD was discovered when it was realized that cells often contain unexpectedly low concentrations of mRNAs that are transcribed from alleles carrying nonsense mutations.^[4] Nonsense mutations code for a premature stop codon which causes the protein to be shortened. The truncated protein may or may not be functional, depending on the severity of what is not translated. In human genetics, NMD has the possibility to not only limit the translation of abnormal proteins, but it can occasionally cause detrimental effects in specific genetic mutations.^[5]

NMD functions to regulate numerous biological functions in a diverse range of cells, including the synaptic plasticity of neurons which may shape adult behavior.^[6]

Pathway

While many of the proteins involved in NMD are not conserved between species, in Saccharomyces cerevisiae (yeast), there are three main factors in NMD: UPF1, UPF2 and UPF3 (UPF3A and UPF3B in humans), that make up the conserved core of the NMD pathway.^[7] All three of these factors are trans-acting elements called up-frameshift (UPF) proteins. In mammals, UPF2 and UPF3 are part of the exon-exon junction complex (EJC) bound to mRNA after splicing along with other proteins, eIF4AIII, MLN51, and the Y14/MAGOH heterodimer, which also function in NMD. UPF1 phosphorylation is controlled by the proteins SMG-1, SMG-5, SMG-6 and SMG-7.

The process of detecting aberrant transcripts occurs during

In addition to the well recognized role of NMD in removing aberrant transcripts, there are transcripts that contain introns within their 3'UTRs.

Although nonsense-mediated mRNA decay reduces nonsense codons, mutations can occur that lead to various health problems and diseases in humans. A dominant-negative or deleterious gain-of-function mutation can occur if premature terminating (nonsense) codons are translated. NMD is becoming increasingly evident in the way it modifies phenotypic consequences because of the broad way it controls gene expression. For instance, the blood disorder Beta thalassemia is inherited and caused by mutations within the upstream region of the β-globin gene.^[10] An individual carrying only one affected allele will have no or extremely low levels of the mutant β-globin mRNA. An even more severe form of the disease can occur called thalassemia intermedia or ‘inclusion body’ thalassemia. Instead of decreased mRNA levels, a mutant transcript produces truncated β chains, which in turn leads to a clinical phenotype in the heterozygote.^[10] Nonsense-mediated decay mutations can also contribute to Marfan syndrome. This disorder is caused by mutations in the fibrillin 1 (FBN1) gene and is resulted from a dominant negative interaction between mutant and wild-type fibrillin-1 gene.^[10]

Research applications

This pathway has a significant effect in the way genes are translated, restricting the amount of gene expression. It is still a new field in genetics, but its role in research has already led scientists to uncover numerous explanations for gene regulation. Studying nonsense-mediated decay has allowed scientists to determine the causes for certain heritable diseases and dosage compensation in mammals.

Heritable diseases

The proopiomelanocortin gene (POMC) is expressed in the hypothalamus, in the pituitary gland. It yields a range of biologically active peptides and hormones and undergoes tissue-specific posttranslational processing to yield a range of biologically active peptides producing adrenocorticotropic hormone (ACTH), b-endorphin, and a-, b- and c-melanocyte-stimulating hormone (MSH).^{[citation needed]} These peptides then interact with different melanocortin receptors (MCRs) and are involved in a wide range of processes including the regulation of body weight (MC3R and MC4R), adrenal steroidogenesis (MC2R) and hair pigmentation (MC1R).^[11] Published in the British Associations of Dermatologists in 2012, Lack of red hair phenotype in a North-African obese child homozygous for a novel POMC null mutation showed nonsense-mediated decay RNA evaluation in a hair pigment chemical analysis. They found that inactivating the POMC gene mutation results in obesity, adrenal insufficiency, and red hair. This has been seen in both in humans and mice. In this experiment they described a 3-year-old boy from Rome, Italy. He was a source of focus because he had Addison's disease and early onset obesity. They collected his DNA and amplified it using PCR. Sequencing analysis revealed a homozygous single substitution determining a stop codon. This caused an aberrant protein and the corresponding amino acid sequence indicated the exact position of the homozygous nucleotide. The substitution was localized in exon 3 and nonsense mutation at codon 68. The results from this experiment strongly suggest that the absence of red hair in non-European patients with early onset obesity and hormone deficiency does not exclude the occurrence of POMC mutations.^[11] By sequencing the patients DNA they found that this novel mutation has a collection of symptoms because of a malfunctioning nonsense-mediated mRNA decay surveillance pathway.

Dosage compensation

There has been evidence that the nonsense-mediated mRNA decay pathway participates in X chromosome dosage compensation in mammals. In higher eukaryotes with dimorphic sex chromosomes, such as humans and fruit flies, males have one X chromosome, whereas females have two. These organisms have evolved a mechanism that compensates not only for the different number of sex chromosomes between the two sexes, but also for the differing X/autosome ratios.^[12] In this genome-wide survey, the scientists found that autosomal genes are more likely to undergo nonsense-mediated decay than X-linked genes. This is because NMD fine tunes X chromosomes and it was demonstrated by inhibiting the pathway. The results were that balanced gene expression between X and autosomes gene expression was decreased by 10–15% no matter the method of inhibition. The NMD pathway is skewed towards depressing expression of larger population or autosomal genes than x-linked ones. In conclusion, the data supports the view that the coupling of alternative splicing and NMD is a pervasive means of gene expression regulation.^[12]

See also

• Non-stop decay, another mRNA surveillance mechanism
• mRNA surveillance

References