A dynamic programming algorithm for prediction of RNA secondary structure has been revised to accommodate folding constraints determined by chemical modification and to include free energy increments for coaxial stacking of helices when they are either adjacent or separated by a single mismatch. Furthermore, free energy parameters are revised to account for recent experimental results for terminal mismatches and hairpin, bulge, internal, and multibranch loops. To demonstrate the applicability of this method, in vivo modification was performed on 5S rRNA in both Escherichia coli and Candida albicans with 1-cyclohexyl-3-(2-morpholinoethyl) carbodiimide metho-p-toluene sulfonate, dimethyl sulfate, and kethoxal. The percentage of known base pairs in the predicted structure increased from 26.3% to 86.8% for the E. coli sequence by using modification constraints. For C. albicans, the accuracy remained 87.5% both with and without modification data. On average, for these sequences and a set of 14 sequences with known secondary structure and chemical modification data taken from the literature, accuracy improves from 67% to 76%. This enhancement primarily reflects improvement for three sequences that are predicted with <40% accuracy on the basis of energetics alone. For these sequences, inclusion of chemical modification constraints improves the average accuracy from 28% to 78%. For the 11 sequences with <6% pseudoknotted base pairs, structures predicted with constraints from chemical modification contain on average 84% of known canonical base pairs. R ecent discoveries have shown that RNA plays a larger role in biology than previously realized, e.g., in posttranscriptional regulation (1), development (2, 3), immunity (4, 5), and peptide bond formation (6, 7). It is necessary to determine the native structures of RNAs to understand their mechanisms of action, and determining secondary structure is a crucial step in this process.RNA secondary structure can be predicted by free energy minimization with nearest neighbor parameters to evaluate stability (8)(9)(10)(11)(12)(13)(14)(15)(16)(17)(18). Previous studies demonstrated that nuclease cleavage data can be used to refine structure prediction and improve accuracy (8, 11). A predicted secondary structure can guide further experiments or comparative sequence analysis (19) and also aid in the design of RNA molecules (20,21).Chemical modification is a technique that reveals solvent accessible nucleotides (22). The nucleotides accessible to 1-cyclohexyl-3-(2-morpholinoethyl) carbodiimide metho-ptoluene sulfonate, dimethyl sulfate, and kethoxal are unpaired, in A-U or G-C pairs at helix ends, in G-U pairs anywhere, or adjacent to G-U pairs. This limited specificity differs from that observed with nucleases, and an algorithm allowing constraints from such chemical modification has not been reported. Chemical modification is used extensively to test hypothesized RNA secondary structures (19,(23)(24)(25)(26)(27)(28). Chemical modification can also be used to deduce possible tertia...

Oligonucleotides are designed to target RNA using base pairing rules, however, they are hampered by poor cellular delivery and non-specific stimulation of the immune system. Small molecules are preferred as lead drugs or probes, but cannot be designed from sequence. Herein, we describe an approach termed Inforna that designs lead small molecules for RNA from solely sequence. Inforna was applied to all human microRNA precursors and identified bioactive small molecules that inhibit biogenesis by binding to nuclease processing sites (41% hit rate). Amongst 29 lead interactions, the most avid interaction is between a benzimidazole (1) and precursor microRNA-96. Compound 1 selectively inhibits biogenesis of microRNA-96, upregulating a protein target (FOXO1) and inducing apoptosis in cancer cells. Apoptosis is ablated when FOXO1 mRNA expression is knocked down by an siRNA, validating compound selectivity. Importantly, microRNA profiling shows that 1 only significantly effects microRNA-96 biogenesis and is more selective than an oligonucleotide.

Fluorescent imaging of RNA in living cells is a technically challenging problem in cell biology. One strategy for genetically encoding fluorescent RNAs is to express them as fusions with ‘RNA mimics of GFP’. These are short aptamer tags that exhibit fluorescence upon binding otherwise nonfluorescent fluorophores that resemble those found in GFP. We find that the brightest of these aptamers, Spinach, often exhibits reduced fluorescence after it is fused to RNAs of interest. We show that a combination of thermal instability and a propensity for misfolding account for the low fluorescence of various Spinach-RNA fusions. Using systematic mutagenesis, we identified nucleotides that account for the poor folding of Spinach, and generated Spinach2, which exhibits markedly improved thermal stability and folding in cells. Furthermore, we show that Spinach2 largely retains its fluorescence when fused to various RNAs. Using Spinach2, we detail the cellular dynamics of the CGG trinucleotide-repeat containing “toxic RNA” associated with Fragile-X tremor/ataxia syndrome, and show that these RNAs form nuclear foci with unexpected morphological plasticity that is regulated by the cell cycle and by small molecules. Together, these data demonstrate that Spinach2 exhibits improved versatility for fluorescently labeling RNAs in living cells.

Summary A repeat expansion in C9ORF72 causes frontotemporal dementia and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (c9FTD/ALS). RNA of the expanded repeat (r(GGGGCC)exp) forms nuclear foci or undergoes repeat-associated non-ATG (RAN) translation producing “c9RAN proteins”. Since neutralizing r(GGGGCC)exp could inhibit these potentially toxic events, we sought to identify small molecule binders of r(GGGGCC)exp. Chemical and enzymatic probing of r(GGGGCC)8 indicate it adopts a hairpin structure in equilibrium with a quadruplex structure. Using this model, bioactive small molecules targeting r(GGGGCC)exp were designed and found to significantly inhibit RAN translation and foci formation in cultured cells expressing r(GGGGCC)66 and neurons trans-differentiated from fibroblasts of repeat expansion carriers. Finally, we show that poly(GP) c9RAN proteins are specifically detected in c9ALS patient cerebrospinal fluid. Our findings highlight r(GGGGCC)exp-binding small molecules as a possible c9FTD/ALS therapeutic, and suggest c9RAN proteins could potentially serve as a pharmacodynamic biomarker to assess efficacy of therapies that target r(GGGGCC)exp.