Post-transcriptional regulation of microRNA expression

Obernosterer G, Leuschner PJ, Alenius M, Martinez J., Post-transcriptional regulation of microRNA expression. RNA., 2006 May 31; [Epub ahead of print]

In particular, miR-138 is spatially restricted to distinct cell types, while its precursor, pre-miR-138-2, is ubiquitously expressed throughout all tissues analyzed. Furthermore, pre-miR-138-2 is exported from the nucleus to the cytoplasm, suggesting that cleavage of this pre-miRNA by Dicer is restricted to certain tissues and cell types. Thus, differential processing of pre-miRNAs might be an alternative mechanism to control miRNA function.