Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
Review
. 2002;3(3):REVIEWS0004.
doi: 10.1186/gb-2002-3-3-reviews0004. Epub 2002 Feb 28.

Untranslated regions of mRNAs

Flavio Mignone  1 , Carmela Gissi, Sabino Liuni, Graziano Pesole
Affiliations
Review

Untranslated regions of mRNAs

Flavio Mignone et al. Genome Biol. 2002.

Abstract

Gene expression is finely regulated at the post-transcriptional level. Features of the untranslated regions of mRNAs that control their translation, degradation and localization include stem-loop structures, upstream initiation codons and open reading frames, internal ribosome entry sites and various cis-acting elements that are bound by RNA-binding proteins.

PubMed Disclaimer

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
The generic structure of a eukaryotic mRNA, illustrating some post-transcriptional regulatory elements that affect gene expression. Abbreviations (from 5' to 3'): UTR, untranslated region; m7G, 7-methyl-guanosine cap; hairpin, hairpin-like secondary structures; uORF, upstream open reading frame; IRES, internal ribosome entry site; CPE, cytoplasmic polyadenylation element; AAUAAA, polyadenylation signal.
Figure 2
Figure 2
The percentage of complete UTR sequences in the different taxonomic classes that contain (a) introns or (b) upstream AUGs, upstream ORFs or IRES elements. Hum, human; mam, other mammals; rod, rodents; av, Aves; vrt, other vertebrates; lil, Liliopsidae; vir, other plants (Viridiplantae); inv, invertebrates; fun, fungi. Data are taken from UTRdb [47].
See this image and copyright information in PMC

Similar articles

See all similar articles

Cited by

See all "Cited by" articles

References

    1. Venter JC, Adams MD, Myers EW, Li PW, Mural RJ, Sutton GG, Smith HO, Yandell M, Evans CA, Holt RA, et al. The sequence of the human genome. Science. 2001;291:1304–1351. - PubMed
    1. Lander ES, Linton LM, Birren B, Nusbaum C, Zody MC, Baldwin J, Devon K, Dewar K, Doyle M, FitzHugh W, et al. Initial sequencing and analysis of the human genome. Nature. 2001;409:860–921. - PubMed
    1. van der Velden AW, Thomas AA. The role of the 5' untranslated region of an mRNA in translation regulation during development. Int J Biochem Cell Biol. 1999;31:87–106. - PubMed
    1. Jansen RP. mRNA localization: message on the move. Nat Rev Mol Cell Biol. 2001;2:247–256. - PubMed
    1. Bashirullah A, Cooperstock RL, Lipshitz HD. Spatial and temporal control of RNA stability. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA. 2001;98:7025–7028. - PMC - PubMed

Publication types

MeSH terms

LinkOut - more resources