Engineered riboswitches control gene expression by small molecules

Suess, Beatrix; Hanson, Shane; Müller, Michael M.

doi:10.1240/sav_gbm_2005_h_001236

Cited by 1 publication

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“…Previous work has revealed that bacterial riboswitches that act on a translational level often regulate gene expression through ligand-dependent structural changes in the 59-UTR that provide or limit access to the ribosome binding site (RBS) of an RNA transcript (Nudler and Mironov 2004). This insight has inspired efforts to convert synthetic aptamers into riboswitches through rational engineering (Werstuck and Green 1998;Desai and Gallivan 2004;Suess 2005) or genetic screens and selections (Lynch et al 2007;Topp and Gallivan 2008;Weigand et al 2008). Here, we report that synthetic riboswitches that modulate translation in bacteria can be located within the coding region of a gene and that opportunities for developing new riboswitches may be enhanced by placing fewer restrictions on the expected mechanisms of RNA-based genetic regulation.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Riboswitches in unexpected places—A synthetic riboswitch in a protein coding region

Topp

Gallivan²

2008

RNA

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In natural and engineered systems, cis-RNA regulatory elements such as riboswitches are typically found within untranslated regions rather than within the protein coding sequences of genes. However, RNA sequences with important regulatory roles can exist within translated regions. Here, we present a synthetic riboswitch that is encoded within the translated region of a gene and represses Escherichia coli gene expression greater than 25-fold in the presence of a small-molecule ligand. The ability to encode riboswitches within translated regions as well as untranslated regions provides additional opportunities for creating new genetic control elements. Furthermore, evidence that a riboswitch can function in the translated region of a gene suggests that future efforts to identify natural riboswitches should consider this possibility.

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