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The enzymes and control of eukaryotic mRNA turnover

Nature Structural & Molecular Biology volume 11, pages 121–127 (2004)Cite this article

The degradation of eukaryotic mRNAs plays important roles in the modulation of gene expression, quality control of mRNA biogenesis and antiviral defenses. In the past five years, many of the enzymes involved in this process have been identified and mechanisms that modulate their activities have begun to be identified. In this review, we describe the enzymes of mRNA degradation and their properties. We highlight that there are a variety of enzymes with different specificities, suggesting that individual nucleases act on distinct subpopulations of transcripts within the cell. In several cases, translation factors that bind mRNA inhibit these nucleases. In addition, recent work has begun to identify distinct mRNP complexes that recruit the nucleases to transcripts through different mRNA-interacting proteins. These properties and complexes suggest multiple mechanisms by which mRNA degradation could be regulated.

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Figure 1
Figure 2
Figure 3: Models for exosome structure and function.
Figure 4: Eukaryotic decapping enzymes.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Molecular and Cellular Biology and Howard Hughes Medical Institute, University of Arizona, 1007 E. Lowell Street, Tucson, 85721-0106, Arizona, USA

    Roy Parker

  2. Laboratory of Macromolecular Structure, Institute of Molecular and Cell Biology, 30 Medical Drive, 117609, Singapore

    Haiwei Song

  3. Department of Biological Sciences, National University of Singapore, 14 Science Drive 4, 117543, Singapore

    Haiwei Song

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Parker, R., Song, H. The enzymes and control of eukaryotic mRNA turnover. Nat Struct Mol Biol 11, 121–127 (2004). https://doi.org/10.1038/nsmb724

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