method for identifying target sites within mrna that are efficiently cleaved by the RNA process, and method for identifying 21-23 nt RNAs that efficiently mediate RNA.

摘要

A method for identifying target sites within mRNAs that are efficiently separated by the RNA process and method for identifying 21-23 nt RNAs that efficiently mediate the present invention relates to an in vitro drosophila system that has been used to demonstrate that dsrna is processed for 21-23 nucleotide length rna segments. In addition, when these 21-23nt fragments are purified and added back to the drosophila extracts, they mediate rna interference in the absence of long dsrna. therefore, these 21-23 nt fragments are the specific mediators for rna degradation sequence. A molecular signal, which may be its specific length, must be present in these 21-23 nt fragments to recruit cellular factors involved in RNA. This invention encompasses these 21-23 nt fragments and their use for specifically inactivating gene function. The use of these fragments (or chemically synthesized oligonucleotides of the same or similar nature) enables the targeting of specific mRNAs for degradation in mammalian cells, where the use of long DNAs to produce gene function is useful in genomic and functional therapeutic applications.