Two-timing zinc finger transcription factors liaising with RNA

Classical zinc fingers (ZFs) are one of the most common protein domains in higher eukaryotes and have been known for almost 30 years to act as sequence-specific DNA-binding domains. This knowledge has come, however, from the study of a small number of archetypal proteins, and a larger picture is beginning to emerge that ZF functions are far more diverse than originally suspected. Here, we review the evidence that a subset of ZF proteins live double lives, binding to both DNA and RNA targets and frequenting both the cytoplasm and the nucleus. This duality can create an important additional level of gene regulation that serves to connect transcriptional and post-transcriptional control.