My RNA world: past, present and future
- Genetics and Developmental Biology, University of Connecticut Health Center, Farmington, Connecticut 06030-6403, USA
- Corresponding author: carmichael{at}nso2.uchc.edu
This extract was created in the absence of an abstract.
Over the past 20 years, we have contributed some (admittedly minor!) insights into RNA processing and function, often using a murine DNA tumor virus as a model system. But some of these small insights have provided important lessons on how to do science, at least to us. I will offer one example. Early on, our focus was on how RNA was expressed and regulated during polyoma virus infection of cultured mouse cells. When we first examined the viral pattern of gene expression from bidirectional transcription units on its circular genome, we saw an excess of early-strand transcripts at early times, but a great excess of late-strand transcripts at late times (after the onset of DNA replication). This could easily have been interpreted as a promoter switch to explain the viral early-late switch, and this was our first thought. However, closer analysis (reporter assays and nuclear run-on experiments) revealed that the …
