AUTHOR=Carrier Marie-Claude , Ng Kwan Lim Evelyne , Jeannotte Gabriel , Massé Eric 

TITLE=Trans-Acting Effectors Versus RNA Cis-Elements: A Tightly Knit Regulatory Mesh

JOURNAL=Frontiers in Microbiology

VOLUME=11

YEAR=2020

URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/microbiology/articles/10.3389/fmicb.2020.609237

DOI=10.3389/fmicb.2020.609237

ISSN=1664-302X

ABSTRACT=<p>Prokaryotic organisms often react instantly to environmental variations to ensure their survival. They can achieve this by rapidly and specifically modulating translation, the critical step of protein synthesis. The translation machinery responds to an array of <italic>cis</italic>-acting elements, located on the RNA transcript, which dictate the fate of mRNAs. These <italic>cis</italic>-encoded elements, such as RNA structures or sequence motifs, interact with a variety of regulators, among them small regulatory RNAs. These small regulatory RNAs (sRNAs) are especially effective at modulating translation initiation through their interaction with <italic>cis</italic>-encoded mRNA elements. Here, through selected examples of canonical and non-canonical regulatory events, we demonstrate the intimate connection between mRNA <italic>cis</italic>-encoded features and sRNA-dependent translation regulation. We also address how sRNA-based mechanistic studies can drive the discovery of new roles for <italic>cis</italic>-elements. Finally, we briefly overview the challenges of using translation regulation by synthetic regulators as a tool.</p>