Handling Editor: Swathi Arur
ABSTRACT
The germline genome is guarded against invading foreign genetic elements by small RNA-dependent gene-silencing pathways. Components of these pathways localize to, or form distinct aggregates in the vicinity of, germ granules. These components and their dynamics in and out of granules are currently being intensively studied. Here, we report the identification of PLP-1, a Caenorhabditis elegans protein related to the human single-stranded nucleic acid-binding protein Pur-alpha, as a component of germ granules in C. elegans. We show that PLP-1 is essential for silencing different types of transgenes in the germ line and for suppressing the expression of several endogenous genes controlled by the germline gene-silencing pathways. Our results reveal that PLP-1 functions downstream of small RNA biogenesis during initiation of gene silencing. Based on these results and the earlier findings that Pur-alpha proteins interact with both RNA and protein, we propose that PLP-1 couples certain RNAs with their protein partners in the silencing complex. PLP-1 orthologs localized on RNA granules may similarly contribute to germline gene silencing in other organisms.
Footnotes
Competing interests
The authors declare no competing or financial interests.
Author contributions
Conceptualization: R.V., L.T., K.S.; Methodology: R.V., L.T., L.W., A.F., K.S.; Validation: R.V., L.T., L.W., A.F., K.S.; Formal analysis: R.V., L.T., L.W., A.F., K.S.; Investigation: R.V., L.T., L.W., A.F., K.S.; Resources: A.F., K.S.; Writing - original draft: R.V., L.T., K.S.; Writing - review & editing: K.S.; Supervision: K.S.; Project administration: K.S.; Funding acquisition: K.S.
Funding
Research in the K.S. laboratory is supported by grants from the Department of Biotechnology, Ministry of Science and Technology, India (BT/PR29010/BRB/10/1694/2018) and the Science and Engineering Research Board, Department of Science and Technology, Ministry of Science and Technology, India (EMR/2016/002272). Work in the Fire laboratory is supported by National Institutes of Health grant R35GM130366. Deposited in PMC for release after 12 months.
Data availability
All raw small RNA and mRNA high-throughput sequencing data, and lists of identified C. elegans genes and read counts have been deposited in GEO under accession number GSE161011.
Supplementary information
Supplementary information available online at https://dev.biologists.org/lookup/doi/10.1242/dev.195578.supplemental
- Received July 31, 2020.
- Accepted October 6, 2020.
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