Enrichment of midsized RNAs with manganese chloride precipitation.

Enrichment of specific RNAs is important for RNA analysis. MnCl has been used previously to enrich viroid RNA fractions from total RNA from infected plants. We have expanded this method to show that MnCl can enrich single-stranded as well as structured RNAs of 450 nt and below from a total RNA preparation.

Processing of Potato Spindle Tuber Viroid RNAs in Yeast, a Nonconventional Host.

Potato spindle tuber viroid (PSTVd) is a circular, single-stranded, noncoding RNA plant pathogen that is a useful model for studying the processing of noncoding RNA in eukaryotes. Infective PSTVd circles are replicated via an asymmetric rolling circle mechanism to form linear multimeric RNAs. An endonuclease cleaves these into monomers, and a ligase seals these into mature circles.