Is there anything in the cell that has just one function — more moonlighting — this time mRNA

Able was I ere I saw Elba said Napoleon. It’s called a palindrome, and can be read either way. So can DNA which brings me to antisense transcription of DNA, particularly in two famous retroviruses –the AIDS virus (HIV1) and HTLV-1.  

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. vol. 118 e2014783118 ’21  shows that mRNA can moonlight to do other things than code for protein.  Here’s a direct quote to set the stage.

“Retroviruses share a similar genome structure. The integrated retroviral genome, called the provirus, has two identical long terminal repeats (LTR) located at its 5′ and 3′ ends, respectively. The 5′ LTR acts as the promoter of almost all retroviral genes and thus is indispensable for viral transcription and replication. However, selective methylation of the 5′ LTR and the subsequent viral latency have been observed in HIV-1 and HTLV-1. In contrast, the 3′ LTR of HIV-1 and HTLV-1 remains nonmethylated, and recent findings have shown that novel retroviral genes are transcribed from the 3′ LTR in an antisense direction”.

The 3′ LTR of the AIDS virus enables antisense transcription for  the unimaginatively named ASP (AntiSense Protein).  So the mRNA for ASP is transcribed in the nucleus.  But it doesn’t get out as well as it might, because its 5′ end isn’t polyAdenylated.  So it sticks around in the nucleus and binds to DNA, turning off transcription of the regular HIV1 genome — e.g. helping to maintain viral latency (and preventing a true cure of HIV1 in any individual).

This is unprecedented.  Here is an mRNA with a completely different function (e.g. regulating gene expression).  This is classic moonlighting as something else and the authors call the mRNA for ASP a bifunctional mRNA. 

The other, retrovirus HTLV-1 also has an antisense transcript making a protein called HBZ (your don’t want to know what it stands for). Unlike ASP, HBZ turns on a variety of genes. 

I’ve been fascinated by moonlighting molecules, probably because they show the depths of our ignorance of the biochemical machinations inside the cell.  Even when you think you’ve got the function of a molecule tied down, it goes off and does something else. 

 Here are some links to other posts on the subject.  To get to them just click on the titles

Moonlighting molecules

More moonlighting

A moonlighting quorum sensing molecule

More moonlighting

Well we used to think we understood what ion channels in the cell membrane did and how they worked. To a significant extent we do know how they conduct ions, permitting some and keeping others out in response to changes in membrane potential and neurotransmitters. It’s when they start doing other things that we begin to realize that we’re not in Kansas anymore.

Abnormal binding of one protein (filamin A) to one of the classic ion channels (the alpha7 nicotinic cholinergic receptor) may actually lead to a therapy for Alzheimer’s disease — for details please see — https://luysii.wordpress.com/2021/03/25/the-science-behind-cassava-sciences-sava/

The Kv3.3 voltage gating potassium channel is widely expressed in the brain.  Large amounts are found neurons concerned with sound, where firing rates are high.  Kv3.3 repolarizes them (and quickly) so they can fire again in response to high frequency stimuli (e.g. sound).  Kv3.3 is also found in the cerebellum and a mutation Glycine #529 –> Arginine is associated with a hereditary disease causing incoordination (type 13 spinocerebellar ataxia or SCA13 to be exact).

Amazingly the mutant conducts potassium ions quite normally.  The mutation (G529R) causes the channel not to bind to something called Arp2/3 with the result that actin (a muscle protein but found in just about every cell in the body) doesn’t form the network it usually does  at the synapse.  Synapses don’t work normally when this happens. 

Why abnormally functioning synapses isn’t lethal is anyone’s guess, as is why the mutation only affects the cerebellum.  So it’s another function of an ion channel, completely unrelated to its ability to conduct ions (e.g. moonlighting).