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Updated: Jan 5, 2026

Mapping the Structure-Function Relationships of Disordered Oncogenic Transcription Factors Using Transcriptomic Analysis
Published on: June 27, 2020
Fusion Transcripts of Adjacent Genes: New Insights into the World of Human Complex Transcripts in Cancer
Vincenza Barresi1, Ilaria Cosentini2, Chiara Scuderi3
1Department of Biomedical and Biotechnological Sciences, Section of Medical Biochemistry, University of Catania, 95123 Catania, Italy. vincenza.barresi@unict.it.
Abstract:
The awareness of genome complexity brought a radical approach to the study of transcriptome, opening eyes to single RNAs generated from two or more adjacent genes according to the present consensus. This kind of transcript was thought to originate only from chromosomal rearrangements, but the discovery of readthrough transcription opens the doors to a new world of fusion RNAs. In the last years many possible intergenic cis-splicing mechanisms have been proposed, unveiling the origins of transcripts that contain some exons of both the upstream and downstream genes. In some cases, alternative mechanisms, such as trans-splicing and transcriptional slippage, have been proposed. Five databases, containing validated and predicted Fusion Transcripts of Adjacent Genes (FuTAGs), are available for the scientific community. A comparative analysis revealed that two of them contain the majority of the results. A complete analysis of the more widely characterized FuTAGs is provided in this review, including their expression pattern in normal tissues and in cancer. Gene structure, intergenic splicing patterns and exon junction sequences have been determined and here reported for well-characterized FuTAGs. The available functional data and the possible roles in cancer progression are discussed.
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