Related Experiment Video
Updated: Aug 17, 2026

mRNA Interactome Capture from Plant Protoplasts
Published on: July 28, 2017
Orphan transcripts in Arabidopsis thaliana: identification of several hundred previously unrecognized genes
Diego Mauricio Riaño-Pachón1, Ingo Dreyer, Bernd Mueller-Roeber
1Department of Molecular Biology, Institute for Biochemistry and Biology, University of Potsdam, Karl-Liebknecht-Str. 25, Haus 20, D-14476 Golm/Potsdam, Germany.
Abstract:
Expressed sequence tags (ESTs) represent a huge resource for the discovery of previously unknown genetic information and functional genome assignment. In this study we screened a collection of 178 292 ESTs from Arabidopsis thaliana by testing them against previously annotated genes of the Arabidopsis genome. We identified several hundreds of new transcripts that match the Arabidopsis genome at so far unassigned loci. The transcriptional activity of these loci was independently confirmed by comparison with the Salk Whole Genome Array Data. To a large extent, the newly identified transcriptionally active genomic regions do not encode 'classic' proteins, but instead generate non-coding RNAs and/or small peptide-coding RNAs of presently unknown biological function. More than 560 transcripts identified in this study are not represented by the Affymetrix GeneChip arrays currently widely used for expression profiling in A. thaliana. Our data strongly support the hypothesis that numerous previously unknown genes exist in the Arabidopsis genome.
Related Concept Videos
Ribosome Profiling
Applications of ribosome profiling
Ribosome profiling has many applications, including in vivo monitoring of translation inside a particular organ or tissue type and quantifying new protein synthesis levels.
The technique helps...
Alternative RNA Splicing
There are five types of alternative RNA splicing that vary in the ways the pre-mRNA segments are removed or retained in the mature mRNA. The first...
RNA-seq
Before the discovery of RNA-seq, microarray-based methods and Sanger sequencing were used for transcriptome analysis. However, while microarray-based...
Genome Size and the Evolution of New Genes
DNA Microarrays
Gene Families
Occasionally these regions can be adapted to take on new roles within the organism, becoming novel genes...

