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Long-lasting RNAi activity in mammalian neurons
Kazuya Omi1, Katsushi Tokunaga, Hirohiko Hohjoh
1Department of Human Genetics, Graduate School of Medicine, The University of Tokyo, 7-3-1 Hongo, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo 113-0033, Japan.
Abstract:
The effect of RNA interference (RNAi) induced by synthetic small interfering RNAs (siRNAs) on proliferating mammalian cells appears to last for approximately 3-7 days after its induction. Here we show that the RNAi activity induced by a synthetic 21-nucleotide siRNA duplex in postmitotic neurons, mouse primary hippocampal neurons and neurons that differentiated from mouse embryonal carcinoma P19 cells persists for at least 3 weeks, suggesting long-lasting RNAi activity in mammalian neurons. In addition, we also show that an apoptotic (or antiviral) pathway triggered by long dsRNAs is generated during neuronal differentiation of P19 cells, by which the sequence-specific RNAi activity involving long dsRNA appears to be masked.