Structurally adapted RNA can inhibit cancer
An organism, and every cell in it, is a dynamic entity. For the organism to function, the cells need to react to the surrounding environment, be it a bacterial infection or a temperature change. It can also be about adapting to changes in the fetus, when the organism grows from egg to human. How the cells coordinate these changes is one of the big questions that Katja Petzold and her research group at Karolinska Institutet tries to answer.
In an article in the journal Nature, they now report that they have found how short RNA molecules, microRNAs, control the production of proteins in the cell. This discovery opens completely new treatments for cancer, as it has been shown that a certain type of RNA molecule involved in cancer can affect its degree of activity by changing its structure. With a drug that can control this activity in a desirable way, the cancer cells could be prevented. More specifically, it is the microRNA molecule miR-34a that plays an important role in the development of cancer by indirectly affecting the activity of the protein p53, which is known to prevent cancer formation.
It is already known that microRNAs (miRNAs) are important for controlling the cells. A miRNA attacks a messenger RNA (mRNA) to control the production of a particular protein. However, it has not been understood exactly how miRNAs control different mRNAs.
– Like many life processes, it is complex. In this case, I believe that the complexity is due to the ability of miRNAs to structure their cellular function depending on the physiological conditions in the environment.
Studying high-resolution biological structures to understand the mechanisms behind them is difficult. So far, it has been done mostly in vitro, ie in a lab environment. This reach a bit but not all the way; we need to bridge the gap between structural biology and molecular biology, says Katja Petzold. Therefore, she develops methods for studying the structure and dynamics of RNA in vivo. At present, it is only possible with nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR), used to study RNA structures in the high-resolution cell.