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The exon junction complex differentially marks spliced junctions

Nature Structural & Molecular Biology volume 17, pages 1269–1271 (2010)Cite this article

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Abstract

The exon junction complex (EJC), which is deposited onto mRNAs as a consequence of splicing, is involved in multiple post-transcriptional events in metazoa. Here, using Drosophila melanogaster cells, we show that only some introns trigger EJC-dependent nonsense-mediated mRNA decay and that EJC association with particular spliced junctions depends on RNA cis-acting sequences. This study provides the first evidence to our knowledge that EJC deposition is not constitutive but instead is a regulated process.

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Figure 1: Specific 3′ UTRs confer splicing- and EJC-dependent NMD sensitivity upon reporter mRNAs.
Figure 2: EJCs assemble on specific spliced mRNAs.
Figure 3: RNA cis-acting elements specify EJC-dependent NMD.

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Acknowledgements

We thank E. Conti (Max Planck Institute of Biochemistry) and E. Izaurralde (Max Planck Institute for Developmental Biology) for fly cDNAs, A. Echard (Institut Curie) for S2 cells, J. Montagne (Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique) and D. St. Johnston (Univ. of Cambridge) for antibodies, B. Séraphin and all members of our laboratories for helpful advice and discussions and D. Rio, J. Conaway, R. Krumlauf and E. Izaurralde for carefully reading the manuscript and for helpful comments. This work was supported by the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (H.L.H.), l'Agence Nationale de Recherche (H.L.H.), the Action Thématique et Incitative sur Programme (ATIP) of the Research Ministry (H.L.H.) and the Stowers Institute for Medical Research (M.B.). J.S. is the recipient of a fellowship from the Fondation pour la Recherche Médicale.

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Author notes

  1. Jérôme Saulière and Nazmul Haque: These authors contributed equally to this work.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institut de Biologie de l'Ecole Normale Supérieure, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique UMR8197, Paris, France

    Jérôme Saulière, Isabelle Barbosa & Hervé Le Hir

  2. Stowers Institute for Medical Research, Kansas City, Missouri, USA

    Nazmul Haque, Scot Harms & Marco Blanchette

  3. Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, Kansas University Medical Center, Kansas City, Kansas, USA

    Marco Blanchette

Authors
  1. Jérôme Saulière
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  2. Nazmul Haque
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  3. Scot Harms
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  4. Isabelle Barbosa
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  5. Marco Blanchette
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Contributions

J.S., I.B., S.H. and N.H. cloned reporter constructs and performed luciferase assays and RNA analysis; N.H. established the cell line expressing the tagged EJC core proteins and performed RNP immunoprecipitations; M.B. and H.L.H. provided resources and conceived and directed the project; J.S., M.B. and H.L.H. wrote the paper.

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Correspondence to Marco Blanchette or Hervé Le Hir.

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The authors declare no competing financial interests.

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Supplementary Figures 1–5 and Supplementary Methods (PDF 3986 kb)

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Saulière, J., Haque, N., Harms, S. et al. The exon junction complex differentially marks spliced junctions. Nat Struct Mol Biol 17, 1269–1271 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1038/nsmb.1890

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