Understanding How mRNA Stability Influences Immune Diseases

Understanding how mRNA stability influences immune diseases

A pizza shop with 30 delivery people ought to be able to deliver a lot of pizzas - if their cars don't break down on the way.

How quickly mRNA degrades is linked to autoimmune disease risk

A pizza shop with 30 delivery people ought to be able to deliver a lot of pizzas—if their cars don't break down on the way. Likewise, genes that produce a lot of messenger RNA (mRNA) molecules can build a lot of proteins—if these molecules don't fall apart before the job gets done.

Autoimmune Disease Risk Linked to mRNA Instability

Researchers at the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) have identified thousands of genetic variants that affect the stability of messenger RNA (mRNA) transcripts to regulate gene expression, many of them linked to autoimmune conditions such as lupus or multiple sclerosis. Their findings, published today in Nature Genetics, showcase the importance of an often overlooked mechanism of disease. “Most research has focused on how mRNA is made…