For instance, some exist to serve as DNA docking sites for proteins which activate or repress RNA transcription. Others, which were the focus of this study, regulate alternative mRNA splicing.
Eukaryotic cells use alternative pre-mRNA splicing to generate protein diversity in development and in response to the environment. By selectively including or excluding regions of pre-mRNAs, cells make on average ten versions of each of the more than 20,000 genes in the genome. RNA-binding proteins are the class of proteins most closely linked to these decisions, but very little is known about how they actually perform their roles in cells.
“For most genes, protein-coding space is distributed in segments on the scale of islands in an ocean,” Lovci said. “RNA processing machinery, including RNA-binding proteins, must pick out these small portions and accurately splice them together to make functional proteins. Our work shows that not only is the sequence space nearby these ‘islands’ important for gene regulation, but that evolutionarily conserved sequences very far away from these islands are important for coordinating splicing decisions.”
Also:
We uncovered a novel mechanism that allows proteins that direct pre-mRNA splicing – RNA-binding proteins – to induce a regulatory effect from greater distances than was thought possible,” said first author Michael T. Lovci, of the Department of Cellular and Molecular Medicine, the Stem Cell Research Program and Institute for Genomic Medicine at UC San Diego.
Yawn. There is a universe out there where Darwinism is true, so junk DNA really is just junk.
Hat tip: Bioethics.com