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Saturation Mutagenesis Reveals Manifold Determinants Of Exon Definition., Shengdong Ke, Vincent Anquetil, Jorge Rojas Zamalloa, Alisha Maity, Anthony Yang, Mauricio A. Arias, Sergey Kalachikov, James J Russo, Jingyue Ju, Lawrence A. Chasin

Student Papers, Posters & Projects

To illuminate the extent and roles of exonic sequences in the splicing of human RNA transcripts, we conducted saturation mutagenesis of a 51-nt internal exon in a three-exon minigene. All possible single and tandem dinucleotide substitutions were surveyed. Using high-throughput genetics, 5560 minigene molecules were assayed for splicing in human HEK293 cells. Up to 70% of mutations produced substantial (greater than twofold) phenotypes of either increased or decreased splicing. Of all predicted secondary structural elements, only a single 15-nt stem-loop showed a strong correlation with splicing, acting negatively. The in vitro formation of exon-protein complexes between the mutant molecules and …