Global snapshots of bacterial RNA networks

While bacteria were long thought to rely primarily on transcriptional control, it is now well established that they also use numerous small RNA s to regulate mRNA translation and stability. There has recently been a surge in studies, including one by Waters et al ([Waters SA, 2017]) in this issue of The EMBO Journal , that have used clever variations of the RNA ‐seq technique to comprehensively map small RNA –target networks.