The Cajal body and histone locus body
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Substructure Analyzer: A User-Friendly Workflow for Rapid Exploration and Accurate Analysis of Cellular Bodies in Fluorescence Microscopy Images
Published on: July 15, 2020
Zehra Nizami1, Svetlana Deryusheva, Joseph G Gall
1Department of Embryology, Carnegie Institution for Science, Baltimore, Maryland 21218, USA.
Abstract:
The Cajal body (CB) is a nuclear organelle present in all eukaryotes that have been carefully studied. It is identified by the signature protein coilin and by CB-specific RNAs (scaRNAs). CBs contain high concentrations of splicing small nuclear ribonucleoproteins (snRNPs) and other RNA processing factors, suggesting that they are sites for assembly and/or posttranscriptional modification of the splicing machinery of the nucleus. The histone locus body (HLB) contains factors required for processing histone pre-mRNAs. As its name implies, the HLB is associated with the genes that code for histones, suggesting that it may function to concentrate processing factors at their site of action. CBs and HLBs are present throughout the interphase of the cell cycle, but disappear during mitosis. The biogenesis of CBs shows the features of a self-organizing structure.
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