Selective Suppression of the Splicing-Mediated MicroRNA Pathway by the Terminal Uridyltransferase Tailor

Uridylation and adenylation of RNAs

The posttranscriptional addition of nontemplated nucleotides to the 3' ends of RNA molecules can have a significant impact on their stability and biological function. It has been recently discovered that nontemplated addition of uridine or adenosine to the 3' ends of RNAs occurs in different organisms ranging from algae to humans, and on different kinds of RNAs, such as histone mRNAs, mRNA fragments, U6 snRNA, mature small RNAs and their precursors etc. These modifications may lead to different outcomes, such as increasing RNA decay, promoting or inhibiting RNA processing, or changing RNA activity. Growing pieces of evidence have revealed that such modifications can be RNA sequence-specific and subjected to temporal or spatial regulation in development. RNA tailing and its outcomes have been associated with human diseases such as cancer. Here, we review recent developments in RNA uridylation and adenylation and discuss the future prospects in this research area.

Tailoring MicroRNA Function: The Role of Uridylation in Antagonizing Mirtron Expression

In this issue of Molecular Cell, Bortolamiol-Becet et al. (2015) and Reimão-Pinto et al. (2015) show that in flies Tailor preferentially uridylates mirtron pre-miRNA hairpins to suppress their biogenesis.

Analysis of Nearly One Thousand Mammalian Mirtrons Reveals Novel Features of Dicer Substrates

Mirtrons are microRNA (miRNA) substrates that utilize the splicing machinery to bypass the necessity of Drosha cleavage for their biogenesis. Expanding our recent efforts for mammalian mirtron annotation, we use meta-analysis of aggregate datasets to identify ~500 novel mouse and human introns that confidently generate diced small RNA duplexes. These comprise nearly 1000 total loci distributed in four splicing-mediated biogenesis subclasses, with 5'-tailed mirtrons as, by far, the dominant subtype. Thus, mirtrons surprisingly comprise a substantial fraction of endogenous Dicer substrates in mammalian genomes. Although mirtron-derived small RNAs exhibit overall expression correlation with their host mRNAs, we observe a subset with substantial differences that suggest regulated processing or accumulation. We identify characteristic sequence, length, and structural features of mirtron loci that distinguish them from bulk introns, and find that mirtrons preferentially emerge from genes with larger numbers of introns. While mirtrons generate miRNA-class regulatory RNAs, we also find that mirtrons exhibit many features that distinguish them from canonical miRNAs. We observe that conventional mirtron hairpins are substantially longer than Drosha-generated pre-miRNAs, indicating that the characteristic length of canonical pre-miRNAs is not a general feature of Dicer substrate hairpins. In addition, mammalian mirtrons exhibit unique patterns of ordered 5' and 3' heterogeneity, which reveal hidden complexity in miRNA processing pathways. These include broad 3'-uridylation of mirtron hairpins, atypically heterogeneous 5' termini that may result from exonucleolytic processing, and occasionally robust decapitation of the 5' guanine (G) of mirtron-5p species defined by splicing. Altogether, this study reveals that this extensive class of non-canonical miRNA bears a multitude of characteristic properties, many of which raise general mechanistic questions regarding the processing of endogenous hairpin transcripts.

Uridylation of RNA Hairpins by Tailor Confines the Emergence of MicroRNAs in Drosophila

Uridylation of RNA species represents an emerging theme in post-transcriptional gene regulation. In the microRNA pathway, such modifications regulate small RNA biogenesis and stability in plants, worms, and mammals. Here, we report Tailor, an uridylyltransferase that is required for the majority of 3′ end modifications of microRNAs in Drosophila and predominantly targets precursor hairpins. Uridylation modulates the characteristic two-nucleotide 3′ overhang of microRNA hairpins, which regulates processing by Dicer-1 and destabilizes RNA hairpins. Tailor preferentially uridylates mirtron hairpins, thereby impeding the production of non-canonical microRNAs. Mirtron selectivity is explained by primary sequence specificity of Tailor, selecting substrates ending with a 3′ guanosine. In contrast to mirtrons, conserved Drosophila precursor microRNAs are significantly depleted in 3′ guanosine, thereby escaping regulatory uridylation. Our data support the hypothesis that evolutionary adaptation to Tailor-directed uridylation shapes the nucleotide composition of precursor microRNA 3′ ends. Hence, hairpin uridylation may serve as a barrier for the de novo creation of microRNAs in Drosophila.

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Tailor is a small RNA uridylyltransferase in Drosophila

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Tailor uridylates pre-miRNAs and regulates miRNA maturation

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Tailor prevents the maturation of non-canonical miRNAs, i.e., mirtrons

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Tailor may act as a barrier for the de novo creation of miRNAs