Evidence for cooperative tandem binding of hnRNP C RRMs in mRNA processing

The human hnRNP C is a ubiquitous cellular protein involved in mRNA maturation. Recently, we have shown that this protein specifically recognizes uridine (U) pentamers through its single RNA recognition motif (RRM). However, a large fraction of natural RNA targets of hnRNP C consists of much longer contiguous uridine stretches. To understand how these extended sites are recognized, we studied the binding of the RRM to U-tracts of 8–11 bases. In vivo investigation of internal translation activation of unr (upstream of N-ras) mRNA indicates that the conservation of the entire hnRNP C binding site, UC(U)(8), is required for hnRNP C-dependent IRES activation. The assays further suggest a synergistic interplay between hnRNP C monomers, dependent on the protein's ability to oligomerize. In vitro spectroscopic and thermodynamic analyses show that isolated RRMs bind to (U)(11) oligomers as dimers. Structural modeling of a ternary double-RRM/RNA complex indicates additionally that two RRM copies can be accommodated on the canonical sequence UC(U)(8). The proposed tandem RRM binding is in very good agreement with the transcriptome-wide recognition of extended U-tracts by full-length hnRNP C, which displays a cross-linking pattern consistent with a positively cooperative RRM dimer binding model.