RNA Interference

Transcript

Roundworms are giving insight into cancer's origins. From the University of Kansas, this is Research Matters. I’m Brendan Lynch.

Lisa Timmons, assistant professor of biology at KU, designs roundworms with luminous green muscles. while this alone is extraordinary, Timmons’ research involves shutting down the roundworms’ radiance with a technique dubbed RNA interference, or R-N-A-i.

Timmons: "To our cells, double stranded RNA looks a lot like a virus — so if we treat a cell with double-stranded RNA, the RNAi mechanisms will chop up the double stranded RNA and any other sequence in the cell that looks like that sequence of double-stranded RNA. You can engineer double-stranded RNA sequences in a test tube. You can make that sequence correspond to a gene that might be involved in cancer. When you treat that cell with double-stranded RNA then that gene will be silenced."

Timmons says her darkened roundworms shed light on RNA interference because they share genes with humans called A-B-C tranporters.

Timmons: "They can grow very quickly in the lab and we can generate mutant worms that are defective in RNAi. ABC transporter genes are required for RNAi in roundworms. And as it turns out the genes that are required for RNA can also be found in humans."

A-B-C transporters encode proteins that pump toxins from a cell. Timmons has found a startling link between these pumps and the R-N-A-i process that silences gene functions.

Timmons: "So we’re trying to understand that connection much better. So we think that these pumps are being over expressed on the surface of these tumor cells and that’s part of the process by which cells became tumorigenic in the first place. We want to understand that so we can better manage cancer and understand how cancer arises in the first place."

Such an understanding could lead to better prevention, novel therapies and new hope for the 1.4 million americans diagnosed with cancer each year.

For more about R-N-A interference, log on to Research Matters DOT K-U DOT E-D-U. From the University of Kansas, I'm Brendan Lynch.

Tell Me More

Faculty profile: Lisa Timmons

Double-stranded RNA (dsRNA) was discovered to have the ability to interfere with gene function in a sequence-specific manner in the model genetic organism Caenorhabditis elegans. dsRNA with sequence homology to that of an endogenous gene or transgene can induce silencing of the corresponding gene or transgene--a process that has been termed RNAi (for dsRNA-mediated genetic interference).

Read the full faculty bio