RNAi Blocking For Us
I almost forgot that RNAi is something involved in our systems when I was finding information about RNA last week. I found about its discovery and also I realized people have been researching it for gene therapy. As you know RNA is usually a single-stranded polymer of nucleotides that is similar to the structure of DNA but has a uracil instead of a thymine in most cases. We have connected these to making proteins but there are ways that these can be altered to make miRNA (microRNA) and siRNA (small interfering RNA), which both have functions in the body for the interference of RNAs.
Many people view these and see a possible way to end cancer. Cancer continuously wants to divide so a way to stop this process would be a large hit to the disease, what is a problem is the stability of RNA. RNA is not as stable as DNA and can be damaged before it is used. A co-delivery system is being considered in an article by Larsson where the RNA and drug that could assist can work together and benefit the participant. In the study co-administration of the gene-silencing RNA and the drug was able to suppress tumor growth in mice versus a control group which did not last the 50 days. I am over summarizing this article but there is already some evidence that these RNA molecules can be useful if used in the correct fashion.
To continue I think it is also interesting how the connection to RNAi discovery and its use for disease kind of lead into each other. These materials were first noticed when several scientists were trying to increase the purple color in a flower by adding RNA but this resulted in the opposite. It is found that RNA added can bind to mRNA or may lead to a circumstance which will cleave it. Some theorize this could be a function of defense when viruses add their own RNA into a cell. We are still unsure how much it at all this may be true for humans but there have been experiments which show human infected with influenza A virus has an increase in small RNA segments. The issue seen is how viruses fight back with their own NS1 gene which blocks and binds processing of the molecules cells would produce.
RNA has shown to be a very simple structure with many functions like DNA. With all these diverse abilities it makes me consider the RNA world to be more of a possibility. Also, I think it is interesting how many times it seems to be what some would consider being a simple experiment that leads to a new discovery no one expected.
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