Two decades of miRNA biology: lessons and challenges
- Department of Developmental Biology, Sloan-Kettering Institute, New York, New York 10065, USA
- Corresponding author: laie{at}mskcc.org
This extract was created in the absence of an abstract.
Introduction
The celebration of 20 years of RNA is opportune to reflect on what has been learned during this time regarding miRNA biology, and challenges that lay ahead. I focus this perspective on genetics, which arguably laid the foundation for the miRNA field. Indeed, genetic studies revealed critical miRNA:target interactions, the fundamental logic of miRNA target recognition, and phenotypically vital usages of miRNA regulation, all prior to formal recognition of the miRNA pathway. Ironically then, deciphering miRNA biology remains as challenging as ever, despite extensive mechanistic insights gained from biochemical and structural approaches, and a wealth of data garnered from genomewide approaches. Nevertheless, accumulating knowledge on miRNA function and ever-expanding genetic resources for manipulating miRNAs and their targets promise an exciting future in understanding in vivo necessities of these tiny RNAs.
The miRNA era exploded in 2001 with the revelation that myriad hairpin-encoding loci generate ∼22 nucleotide (nt) RNAs. However, miRNA …
