Alternative RNA Conformations: Companion or Combatant

By Payal Gupta, Rushikesh M Khadake, Shounok Panja, Krushna Shinde, Ambadas B Rode. 2022

11 citations recorded by the source corpus.

RNA molecules, in one form or another, are involved in almost all aspects of cell physiology, as well as in disease development. The diversity of the functional roles of RNA comes from its intrinsic ability to adopt complex secondary and tertiary structures, rivaling the diversity of proteins. The RNA molecules form dynamic ensembles of many interconverting conformations at a timescale of seconds, which is a key for understanding how they execute their cellular functions. Given the crucial role of RNAs in various cellular processes, we need to understand the RNA molecules from a structural perspective. Central to this review are studies aimed at revealing the regulatory role of conformational equilibria in RNA in humans to understand genetic diseases such as cancer and neurodegenerative diseases, as well as in pathogens such as bacteria and viruses so as to understand the progression of infectious diseases. Furthermore, we also summarize the prior studies on the use of RNA structures as platforms for the rational design of small molecules for therapeutic applications.

Subfields: Molecular Biology

Citations in the corpus

• Accurate RNA 3D structure prediction using a language model-based deep learning approach (2022, neutral): “RNA junctions, for example, can adopt multiple conformations and are better represented as dynamic ensembles 37–39 .”