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Transcriptome-Wide Analysis of microRNA–mRNA Correlations in Tissue Identifies microRNA Targeting Determinants

MicroRNAs are small RNAs that regulate gene expression through complementary base pairing with their target mRNAs. A substantial understanding of microRNA target recognition and repression mechanisms has been reached using diverse empirical and bioinformatic approaches, primarily in vitro biochemica...

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Autores principales: Trinidad-Barnech, Juan Manuel, Fort, Rafael Sebastián, Trinidad Barnech, Guillermo, Garat, Beatriz, Duhagon, María Ana
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2023
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9958706/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36827548
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ncrna9010015
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author Trinidad-Barnech, Juan Manuel
Fort, Rafael Sebastián
Trinidad Barnech, Guillermo
Garat, Beatriz
Duhagon, María Ana
author_facet Trinidad-Barnech, Juan Manuel
Fort, Rafael Sebastián
Trinidad Barnech, Guillermo
Garat, Beatriz
Duhagon, María Ana
author_sort Trinidad-Barnech, Juan Manuel
collection PubMed
description MicroRNAs are small RNAs that regulate gene expression through complementary base pairing with their target mRNAs. A substantial understanding of microRNA target recognition and repression mechanisms has been reached using diverse empirical and bioinformatic approaches, primarily in vitro biochemical or cell culture perturbation settings. We sought to determine if rules of microRNA target efficacy could be inferred from extensive gene expression data of human tissues. A transcriptome-wide assessment of all the microRNA–mRNA canonical interactions’ efficacy was performed using a normalized Spearman correlation (Z-score) between the abundance of the transcripts in the PRAD-TCGA dataset tissues (RNA-seq mRNAs and small RNA-seq for microRNAs, 546 samples). Using the Z-score of correlation as a surrogate marker of microRNA target efficacy, we confirmed hallmarks of microRNAs, such as repression of their targets, the hierarchy of preference for gene regions (3′UTR > CDS > 5′UTR), and seed length (6 mer < 7 mer < 8 mer), as well as the contribution of the 3′-supplementary pairing at nucleotides 13–16 of the microRNA. Interactions mediated by 6 mer + supplementary showed similar inferred repression as 7 mer sites, suggesting that the 6 mer + supplementary sites may be relevant in vivo. However, aggregated 7 mer-A1 seeds appear more repressive than 7 mer-m8 seeds, while similar when pairing possibilities at the 3′-supplementary sites. We then examined the 3′-supplementary pairing using 39 microRNAs with Z-score-inferred repressive 3′-supplementary interactions. The approach was sensitive to the offset of the bridge between seed and 3′-supplementary pairing sites, and the pattern of offset-associated repression found supports previous findings. The 39 microRNAs with effective repressive 3′supplementary sites show low GC content at positions 13–16. Our study suggests that the transcriptome-wide analysis of microRNA–mRNA correlations may uncover hints of microRNA targeting determinants. Finally, we provide a bioinformatic tool to identify microRNA–mRNA candidate interactions based on the sequence complementarity of the seed and 3′-supplementary regions.
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spelling pubmed-99587062023-02-26 Transcriptome-Wide Analysis of microRNA–mRNA Correlations in Tissue Identifies microRNA Targeting Determinants Trinidad-Barnech, Juan Manuel Fort, Rafael Sebastián Trinidad Barnech, Guillermo Garat, Beatriz Duhagon, María Ana Noncoding RNA Article MicroRNAs are small RNAs that regulate gene expression through complementary base pairing with their target mRNAs. A substantial understanding of microRNA target recognition and repression mechanisms has been reached using diverse empirical and bioinformatic approaches, primarily in vitro biochemical or cell culture perturbation settings. We sought to determine if rules of microRNA target efficacy could be inferred from extensive gene expression data of human tissues. A transcriptome-wide assessment of all the microRNA–mRNA canonical interactions’ efficacy was performed using a normalized Spearman correlation (Z-score) between the abundance of the transcripts in the PRAD-TCGA dataset tissues (RNA-seq mRNAs and small RNA-seq for microRNAs, 546 samples). Using the Z-score of correlation as a surrogate marker of microRNA target efficacy, we confirmed hallmarks of microRNAs, such as repression of their targets, the hierarchy of preference for gene regions (3′UTR > CDS > 5′UTR), and seed length (6 mer < 7 mer < 8 mer), as well as the contribution of the 3′-supplementary pairing at nucleotides 13–16 of the microRNA. Interactions mediated by 6 mer + supplementary showed similar inferred repression as 7 mer sites, suggesting that the 6 mer + supplementary sites may be relevant in vivo. However, aggregated 7 mer-A1 seeds appear more repressive than 7 mer-m8 seeds, while similar when pairing possibilities at the 3′-supplementary sites. We then examined the 3′-supplementary pairing using 39 microRNAs with Z-score-inferred repressive 3′-supplementary interactions. The approach was sensitive to the offset of the bridge between seed and 3′-supplementary pairing sites, and the pattern of offset-associated repression found supports previous findings. The 39 microRNAs with effective repressive 3′supplementary sites show low GC content at positions 13–16. Our study suggests that the transcriptome-wide analysis of microRNA–mRNA correlations may uncover hints of microRNA targeting determinants. Finally, we provide a bioinformatic tool to identify microRNA–mRNA candidate interactions based on the sequence complementarity of the seed and 3′-supplementary regions. MDPI 2023-02-13 /pmc/articles/PMC9958706/ /pubmed/36827548 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ncrna9010015 Text en © 2023 by the authors. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Trinidad-Barnech, Juan Manuel
Fort, Rafael Sebastián
Trinidad Barnech, Guillermo
Garat, Beatriz
Duhagon, María Ana
Transcriptome-Wide Analysis of microRNA–mRNA Correlations in Tissue Identifies microRNA Targeting Determinants
title Transcriptome-Wide Analysis of microRNA–mRNA Correlations in Tissue Identifies microRNA Targeting Determinants
title_full Transcriptome-Wide Analysis of microRNA–mRNA Correlations in Tissue Identifies microRNA Targeting Determinants
title_fullStr Transcriptome-Wide Analysis of microRNA–mRNA Correlations in Tissue Identifies microRNA Targeting Determinants
title_full_unstemmed Transcriptome-Wide Analysis of microRNA–mRNA Correlations in Tissue Identifies microRNA Targeting Determinants
title_short Transcriptome-Wide Analysis of microRNA–mRNA Correlations in Tissue Identifies microRNA Targeting Determinants
title_sort transcriptome-wide analysis of microrna–mrna correlations in tissue identifies microrna targeting determinants
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9958706/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36827548
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ncrna9010015
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