The ubiquitous transcription factor NRF (NF-kappaB repressing factor) is a constitutive transcriptional silencer of the multifunctional cytokine interferon-beta. NRF mRNA contains a long 5' untranslated region (5'UTR) predicted to fold into a strong secondary structure. The presence of stable hairpins is known to be incompatible with efficient translation by ribosomal scanning. Using dicistroni...

The mouse growth hormone receptor/growth hormone-binding protein (GHR/BP) gene produces several distinct mRNA forms through alternative splicing, including mRNAs encoding the membrane-bound growth hormone receptor (GHR) and the soluble growth hormone-binding protein (GHBP). Transcripts are also heterogeneous in their 5' regions due to alternative selection of two major 5' untranslated region (5...

OASL1 is a member of the 2'-5'-oligoadenylate synthetase (OAS) family and promotes viral clearance by activating RNase L. OASL1 interacts with the 5'-untranslated region (UTR) of interferon regulatory factor 7 (Irf7) and inhibits its translation. To identify the secondary structure required for OASL1 binding, we examined the 5'-UTR of the Irf7 transcript using "selective 2'-hydroxyl acylation a...

Alcohol dehydrogenase-1 (ADH1) synthesis in O2-deprived roots of maize (Zea mays L.) results from induced transcription and selective translation of ADH1 mRNA. The effect of ADH1 mRNA sequences on message stability and translation was studied in protoplasts of the maize cell line P3377.5' capped and 3' polyadenylated mRNA constructs containing the firefly gene (luc) for luciferase (LUC) or the ...

In previous reports we showed that the long 5' untranslated region (5' UTR) of c-sis, the gene encoding the B chain of platelet-derived growth factor, has translational modulating activity due to its differentiation-activated internal ribosomal entry site (D-IRES). Here we show that the 5' UTR contains three regions with a computer-predicted Y-shaped structure upstream of an AUG codon, each of ...