Document Type
Article
Publication Date
2016
College/Unit
School of Medicine
Department/Program/Center
Biochemistry
Abstract
Alternative pre-mRNA splicing expands the coding capacity of eukaryotic genomes, potentially enabling a limited number of genes to govern the development of complex anatomical structures. Alternative splicing is particularly prevalent in the vertebrate nervous system, where it is required for neuronal development and function. Here, we show that photoreceptor cells, a type of sensory neuron, express a characteristic splicing program that affects a broad set of transcripts and is initiated prior to the development of the light sensing outer segments. Surprisingly, photoreceptors lack prototypical neuronal splicing factors and their splicing profile is driven to a significant degree by the Musashi 1 (MSI1) protein. A striking feature of the photoreceptor splicing program are exons that display a "switch-like" pattern of high inclusion levels in photoreceptors and near complete exclusion outside of the retina. Several ubiquitously expressed genes that are involved in the biogenesis and function of primary cilia produce highly photoreceptor specific isoforms through use of such “switchlike” exons. Our results suggest a potential role for alternative splicing in the development of photoreceptors and the conversion of their primary cilia to the light sensing outer segments.
Digital Commons Citation
Murphy, Daniel; Cieply, Benjamin; Carstens, Russ; Ramamurthy, Visvanathan; and Stoilov, Peter, "The Musashi 1 Controls the Splicing of Photoreceptor-Specific Exons in the Vertebrate Retina" (2016). Faculty & Staff Scholarship. 1973.
https://researchrepository.wvu.edu/faculty_publications/1973
Source Citation
Murphy, D., Cieply, B., Carstens, R., Ramamurthy, V., & Stoilov, P. (2016). The Musashi 1 Controls the Splicing of Photoreceptor-Specific Exons in the Vertebrate Retina. PLOS Genetics, 12(8), e1006256. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pgen.1006256
Comments
© 2016 Murphy et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.