Replication-incompetent influenza A viruses armed with IFN-γ effectively mediate immune modulation and tumor destruction in mice harboring lung cancer.

Low pathogenic influenza A viruses (IAVs) have shown promising oncolytic potential in lung cancer-bearing mice. However, as replication-competent pathogens, they may cause side effects in immunocompromised cancer patients. To circumvent this problem, we genetically engineered nonreplicating IAVs lacking the hemagglutinin (HA) gene (ΔHA IAVs), but reconstituted the viral envelope with recombinant HA proteins to allow a single infection cycle.

BC1 RNA motifs required for dendritic transport in vivo.

BC1 RNA is a small brain specific non-protein coding RNA. It is transported from the cell body into dendrites where it is involved in the fine-tuning translational control. Due to its compactness and established secondary structure, BC1 RNA is an ideal model for investigating the motifs necessary for dendritic localization.

Maternal transcription of non-protein coding RNAs from the PWS-critical region rescues growth retardation in mice.

Prader-Willi syndrome (PWS) is a neurogenetic disorder caused by loss of paternally expressed genes on chromosome 15q11-q13. The PWS-critical region (PWScr) contains an array of non-protein coding IPW-A exons hosting intronic SNORD116 snoRNA genes. Deletion of PWScr is associated with PWS in humans and growth retardation in mice exhibiting ~15% postnatal lethality in C57BL/6 background.

Evidence for a Novel Mechanism of Influenza Virus-Induced Type I Interferon Expression by a Defective RNA-Encoded Protein.

Influenza A virus (IAV) defective RNAs are generated as byproducts of error-prone viral RNA replication. They are commonly derived from the larger segments of the viral genome and harbor deletions of various sizes resulting in the generation of replication incompatible viral particles. Furthermore, small subgenomic RNAs are known to be strong inducers of pattern recognition receptor RIG-I-dependent type I interferon (IFN) responses.

A global view of the nonprotein-coding transcriptome in Plasmodium falciparum.

Nonprotein-coding RNAs (npcRNAs) represent an important class of regulatory molecules that act in many cellular pathways. Here, we describe the experimental identification and validation of the small npcRNA transcriptome of the human malaria parasite Plasmodium falciparum. We identified 630 novel npcRNA candidates.

Deletion of the MBII-85 snoRNA gene cluster in mice results in postnatal growth retardation.

Prader-Willi syndrome (PWS [MIM 176270]) is a neurogenetic disorder characterized by decreased fetal activity, muscular hypotonia, failure to thrive, short stature, obesity, mental retardation, and hypogonadotropic hypogonadism. It is caused by the loss of function of one or more imprinted, paternally expressed genes on the proximal long arm of chromosome 15. Several potential PWS mouse models involving the orthologous region on chromosome 7C exist.