dsRNA structures are enriched in essential genes. (A) The number of essential genes expected by chance to overlap genes associated with EERs from all stages combined (All) or individual development stages compared to the actual observed number of essential genes that overlapped EAGs. (***) P < 0.001; χ2 test. (B) The percentage of essential (left) and nonessential (NE; right) genes associated with an EER on the distal arm and center domains of each chromosome. (C) Tukey box plots of ΔG/nt of the most structured intron in essential (Ess.) and NE genes in center and arm domains of C. elegans autosomes and Chromosome X. (**) P < 0.01; (****) P < 0.0001; Mann–Whitney test. (D) Relative fractions of essential and NE genes on autosome arms, separated by the amount of IR (left) or TR (right) sequence in each gene's noncoding elements (i.e., introns, UTRs).
