piRNA profiling during specific stages of mouse spermatogenesis
piRNA profiling during specific stages of mouse spermatogenesis
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小鼠精子发生特定阶段的 piRNA 分析
DOI：
10.1261/rna.2648411
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发表时间：
2011-07-01
期刊：
影响因子：
4.5
通讯作者：
Han, Chunsheng
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Gan, Haiyun;Lin, Xiwen;Han, Chunsheng
PIWI相互作用RNA（piRNA）是一类在动物性腺中大量表达的小RNA。映射到反转录转座子的piRNA通过“乒乓”扩增环产生以抑制反转录转座子的活性。然而，其他类别的piRNA的生物起源和功能尚未被研究。在这项研究中，我们首先通过深度测序分析了A型精原细胞、粗线期精母细胞和圆形精子细胞中小RNA的表达。然后，我们专注于对本研究中产生的潜在piRNA以及其他已发表的集合进行计算分析。定位到反转录转座子、mRNA和基因间区域的piRNA具有不同的长度分布，并且在精子发生中受到差异调节。产生piRNA的mRNA（PRMR）的表达与其皮尔纳产物呈正相关，占蛋白质编码基因的三分之一，并且在进化上保守并富含剪接异构体和反义转录物。具有优先映射到CDS和3'UTR的piRNA的PRMR被分成在精子发生期间差异表达的三个簇，并且富含与管家活动以及精子发生特异性过程相关的独特功能注释术语集。基因间piRNA分为2992个簇，可能代表尚未报道的新转录单位。参与精子发生的大量基因的转录物是piRNA的前体，并且这些基因受到选择性剪接和反义转录物的复杂调控。piRNA在基因表达中的调节作用有待确定，显然是需要定义的新调节过程的产物。
PIWI-interacting RNAs (piRNAs) are a class of small RNAs abundantly expressed in animal gonads. piRNAs that map to retrotransposons are generated by a "ping-pong" amplification loop to suppress the activity of retrotransposons. However, the biogenesis and function of other categories of piRNAs have yet to be investigated. In this study, we first profiled the expression of small RNAs in type A spermatogonia, pachytene spermatocytes, and round spermatids by deep sequencing. We then focused on the computational analysis of the potential piRNAs generated in the present study as well as other published sets. piRNAs mapping to retrotransposons, mRNAs, and intergenic regions had different length distributions and were differentially regulated in spermatogenesis. piRNA-generating mRNAs (PRMRs), whose expression positively correlated with their piRNA products, constituted one-third of the protein-coding genes and were evolutionarily conserved and enriched with splicing isoforms and antisense transcripts. PRMRs with piRNAs preferentially mapped to CDSs and 3' UTRs partitioned into three clusters differentially expressed during spermatogenesis and enriched with unique sets of functional annotation terms related to housekeeping activities as well as spermatogenesis-specific processes. Intergenic piRNAs were divided into 2992 clusters probably representing novel transcriptional units that have not been reported. The transcripts of a large number of genes involved in spermatogenesis are the precursors of piRNAs, and these genes are intricately regulated by alternative splicing and antisense transcripts. piRNAs, whose regulatory role in gene expression awaits to be identified, are clearly products of a novel regulatory process that needs to be defined.