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RNAi is antagonized by A→I hyper‐editing
Author(s) -
Scadden A D J,
Smith Christopher W J
Publication year - 2001
Publication title -
embo reports
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 4.584
H-Index - 184
eISSN - 1469-3178
pISSN - 1469-221X
DOI - 10.1093/embo-reports/kve244
Subject(s) - rna interference , rna silencing , inosine , small interfering rna , biology , rna , guanosine , rna editing , trans acting sirna , microbiology and biotechnology , wobble base pair , adenosine , genetics , biochemistry , transfer rna , gene
RNA interference (RNAi) and adenosine to inosine conversion are both mechanisms that respond to double‐stranded RNA (dsRNA) and have been suggested to have antiviral roles. RNAi involves processing of dsRNA to short interfering RNAs (siRNAs), which subsequently mediate degradation of the cognate mRNAs. Deamination of adenosines changes the coding capacity of the RNA, as inosine is decoded as guanosine, and alters the structure because A–U base pairs are replaced by I·U wobble pairs. Here we show that RNAi is inhibited if the triggering dsRNA is first deaminated by ADAR2. Moreover, we show that production of siRNAs is progressively inhibited with increasing deamination and that this is sufficient to explain the inhibition of RNAi upon hyper‐editing of dsRNAs.