Two small temporal RNAs (stRNAs), lin-4 and let-7, control developmental timing in Caenorhabditis elegans. We find that these two regulatory RNAs are members of a large class of 21- to 24-nucleotide noncoding RNAs, called microRNAs (miRNAs). We report on 55 previously unknown miRNAs in C. elegans. The miRNAs have diverse expression patterns during development: a let-7 paralog is temporally coex...

There are errors in Table 1. The trans-heterozygous genotypes under 'etl-1 genotype' are not displayed in the standard way; ku491+ should be ku491/+, ok1002+ should be ok1002/+ and ku491ok1002 should be ku491/ok1002. The correct table is displayed underneath. an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribut...

First miRNAs were described in a flatworm species C. elegans, which led to an understanding of their important regulatory role in cell differentiation (Lee et al., 1993; Wightmanet al., 1993). Another critical step was the discovery of the second miRNA named let-7, which is a product of expression of a heterochronic switch gene in C. elegans (Reinhart et al., 2000). Loss of let-7 gene activity ...

Cadmium (Cd) is a metal known to be toxic and carcinogenic, but its mechanism of action remains to be fully elucidated. We investigated the gene expression modulation in the human hepatoma cell line HepG2 after exposure to 2 μM and 10 μM Cd using an Agilent microarray. Furthermore, we evaluated the microRNA modulation after exposure to 10 μM Cd with a Low Density Array. At the low concentratio...

It is clear that neural differentiation from human pluripotent stem cells generates cells that are developmentally immature. Here, we show that the let-7 plays a functional role in the developmental decision making of human neural progenitors, controlling whether these cells make neurons or glia. Through gain- and loss-of-function studies on both tissue and pluripotent derived cells, our data s...

Caenorhabditis elegans let-7, a founding member of the microRNA family, is predicted to bind to six sites in the 3'UTR of the mRNA of its target gene, lin-41, to down-regulate LIN-41. Here, we demonstrate that wild-type let-7 microRNA binds in vitro to RNA from the lin-41 3'UTR. This interaction is dependent on two conserved let-7 complementary sites (LCSs). A 27-nucleotide sequence between the...

Since their discovery, microRNAs became prominent candidates providing missing links on how to explain the developmental and phenotypical variation within one species or among different species. In addition, microRNAs were implicated in diseases such as neurodegeneration and cancer. More recently, the regulation of animal behavior was shown to be influenced by microRNAs. In spite of their numer...

Two paradigm shifts in DNA sequencing technologies-from bulk to single molecules and from optical to electrical detection-are expected to realize label-free, low-cost DNA sequencing that does not require PCR amplification. It will lead to development of high-throughput third-generation sequencing technologies for personalized medicine. Although nanopore devices have been proposed as third-gener...