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Updated: Aug 18, 2025

A Reporter Based Cellular Assay for Monitoring Splicing Efficiency
Published on: September 15, 2021
The ubiquitin-like protein Hub1/UBL-5 functions in pre-mRNA splicing in Caenorhabditis elegans
Kiran Kumar Kolathur1,2, Pallavi Sharma1,3, Nagesh Y Kadam1
1Department of Biological Sciences, Indian Institute of Science Education and Research (IISER) Mohali, Punjab, India.
Abstract:
The ubiquitin-like protein Hub1/UBL-5 associates with proteins non-covalently. Hub1 promotes alternative splicing and splicing of precursor mRNAs with weak introns in yeast and mammalian cells; however, its splicing function has remained elusive in multicellular organisms. Here, we demonstrate the splicing function of Hub1/UBL-5 in the free-living nematode Caenorhabditis elegans. Hub1/UBL-5 binds to the HIND-containing splicing factors Snu66/SART-1 and PRP-38 and associates with other spliceosomal proteins. C. elegans hub1/ubl-5 mutants die at the Larval 3 stage and show splicing defects for selected targets, similar to the mutants in yeast and mammalian cells. UBL-5 complemented growth and splicing defects in Schizosaccharomyces pombe hub1 mutants, confirming its functional conservation. Thus, UBL-5 is important for C. elegans development and plays a conserved pre-mRNA splicing function.
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