| First Author | Jakobson M | Year | 2012 |
| Journal | Cell Death Dis | Volume | 3 |
| Pages | e269 | PubMed ID | 22297299 |
| Mgi Jnum | J:320701 | Mgi Id | MGI:6872499 |
| Doi | 10.1038/cddis.2012.4 | Citation | Jakobson M, et al. (2012) mRNA for N-Bak, a neuron-specific BH3-only splice isoform of Bak, escapes nonsense-mediated decay and is translationally repressed in the neurons. Cell Death Dis 3:e269 |
| abstractText | mRNA for neuronal Bak (N-Bak), a splice variant of pro-apoptotic Bcl-2 family member Bak is expressed in the neurons. Surprisingly the endogeneous N-Bak protein cannot be demonstrated in the neurons, although the antibodies recognize N-Bak protein from in vitro translation or transiently transfected cells. As N-Bak mRNA contains premature termination codon (PTC) at 89 nucleotides upstream from the last exon-exon junction, it could be degraded by nonsense-mediated decay (NMD) during the pioneer round of translation thus explaining the absence of the protein. We show here that the endogeneous neuronal N-Bak mRNA is not the NMD substrate, as it is not accumulating by cycloheximide treatment, it has a long lifetime, and even prevention of PTC by interfering with the alternative splicing did not lead to translation of the Bak mRNA. N-Bak protein is also not revealed by proteasome inhibitors. Our data suggest strong translational arrest of N-Bak mRNA in the neurons. We show that this arrest is partially mediated by 5'-untranslated region of Bak mRNA and it is not released during mitochondrial apoptosis. |
