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Related Concept Videos

Canonical Wnt Signaling Pathway02:54

Canonical Wnt Signaling Pathway

The gene encoding the main signaling molecules of the Wnt signaling pathways (the Wnt proteins) was discovered almost four decades ago by Nüsslein-Volhard and Wieschaus. They identified and originally named the gene "wingless" (wg) after a phenotype discovered during their landmark genetic screen in Drosophila for body pattern defects. At around the same time, another researcher named Harold Varmus found that a murine tumor virus activates the mammalian wg homolog, Int-1, which results in tumor...
Canonical Wnt Signaling Pathway02:54

Canonical Wnt Signaling Pathway

The gene encoding the main signaling molecules of the Wnt signaling pathways (the Wnt proteins) was discovered almost four decades ago by Nüsslein-Volhard and Wieschaus. They identified and originally named the gene "wingless" (wg) after a phenotype discovered during their landmark genetic screen in Drosophila for body pattern defects. At around the same time, another researcher named Harold Varmus found that a murine tumor virus activates the mammalian wg homolog, Int-1, which results in tumor...
Non-Canonical Wnt Signaling Pathways01:41

Non-Canonical Wnt Signaling Pathways

Wnt is a zygotic effect gene that is expressed during very early embryonic development. It regulates various processes in animals starting from early development through the adult stage, such as organogenesis in the embryo and maintenance of neuronal and blood stem cells. Wnt proteins can induce a wide variety of intracellular pathways depending upon the specific abilities of different Wnt ligands to form a complex with shared and cognate receptors in the presence of different co-receptors. The...
Non-Canonical Wnt Signaling Pathways01:41

Non-Canonical Wnt Signaling Pathways

Wnt is a zygotic effect gene that is expressed during very early embryonic development. It regulates various processes in animals starting from early development through the adult stage, such as organogenesis in the embryo and maintenance of neuronal and blood stem cells. Wnt proteins can induce a wide variety of intracellular pathways depending upon the specific abilities of different Wnt ligands to form a complex with shared and cognate receptors in the presence of different co-receptors. The...
Transcription Attenuation in Prokaryotes02:42

Transcription Attenuation in Prokaryotes

Transcriptional attenuation occurs when RNA transcription is prematurely terminated due to the formation of a terminator mRNA hairpin structure.  Bacteria use these hairpins to regulate the transcription process and control the synthesis of several amino acids including histidine, lysine, threonine, and phenylalanine. Transcription attenuation takes place in the non-coding regions of mRNA.
There are several different mechanisms used to attenuate transcription. In ribosome mediated...
Protein Complex Assembly02:41

Protein Complex Assembly

Proteins can form homomeric complexes with another unit of the same protein or heteromeric complexes with different types.  Most protein complexes self-assemble spontaneously via ordered pathways, while some proteins need assembly factors that guide their proper assembly. Despite the crowded intracellular environment, proteins usually interact with their correct partners and form functional complexes.
Many viruses self-assemble into a fully functional unit using the infected host cell to...

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Related Experiment Video

Updated: May 19, 2026

Modeling Paracrine Noncanonical Wnt Signaling In Vitro
11:14

Modeling Paracrine Noncanonical Wnt Signaling In Vitro

Published on: December 10, 2021

Intermolecular 3'UTR-3'UTR interactions drive Wnt gene activation through heteromeric protein assembly.

Ting Cai1, Nelly M Cruz1, Sudipto Basu1

  • 1Cancer Biology and Genetics Program, Sloan Kettering Institute, New York, NY 10065, USA.

Biorxiv : the Preprint Server for Biology
|May 18, 2026
PubMed
Summary

Highly conserved 3' untranslated regions (3'UTRs) of mRNAs play crucial roles in stem cell differentiation. Loss-of-function studies reveal that 3'UTRs regulate protein complex assembly, impacting developmental processes.

Keywords:
3′UTR deletionConserved 3′UTRRNA low complexity regionsWnt transcriptional programantisense oligonucleotidesco-translational heterodimerizationintermolecular mRNA-mRNA interactionsprotein abundance-independent regulationrepeatsstem cell differentiationzebrafish embryogenesisβ-catenin

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The Power of Simplicity: Sea Urchin Embryos as in Vivo Developmental Models for Studying Complex Cell-to-cell Signaling Network Interactions
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The Power of Simplicity: Sea Urchin Embryos as in Vivo Developmental Models for Studying Complex Cell-to-cell Signaling Network Interactions

Published on: February 16, 2017

Related Experiment Videos

Last Updated: May 19, 2026

Modeling Paracrine Noncanonical Wnt Signaling In Vitro
11:14

Modeling Paracrine Noncanonical Wnt Signaling In Vitro

Published on: December 10, 2021

The Power of Simplicity: Sea Urchin Embryos as in Vivo Developmental Models for Studying Complex Cell-to-cell Signaling Network Interactions
07:34

The Power of Simplicity: Sea Urchin Embryos as in Vivo Developmental Models for Studying Complex Cell-to-cell Signaling Network Interactions

Published on: February 16, 2017

Area of Science:

  • Molecular Biology
  • Developmental Biology
  • Genetics

Background:

  • Transcription factors are key regulators of stem cell differentiation.
  • Many transcription factor mRNAs possess highly conserved 3' untranslated regions (3'UTRs).
  • The precise regulatory functions of these 3'UTRs are not fully understood.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To investigate the functional roles of 3'UTRs in stem cell differentiation.
  • To determine if 3'UTRs have regulatory roles independent of protein expression levels.
  • To elucidate the mechanism by which 3'UTRs influence transcriptional regulation.

Main Methods:

  • Performed 3'UTR loss-of-function studies via partial deletion of endogenous 3'UTRs.
  • Assessed stem cell differentiation efficiency and protein expression levels.
  • Utilized zebrafish embryogenesis and human stem cell differentiation models.
  • Investigated intermolecular 3'UTR-3'UTR interactions using antisense oligonucleotides.

Main Results:

  • Partial deletion of 3'UTRs altered stem cell differentiation efficiency in 70% of cases studied.
  • In most cases (6/7), 3'UTR deletions did not affect the expression levels of the encoded proteins.
  • Deletion of the CTNNB1 3'UTR impaired zebrafish embryogenesis and Wnt program induction without altering β-catenin levels.
  • Long intermolecular 3'UTR-3'UTR interactions were shown to facilitate co-translational protein complex assembly.

Conclusions:

  • 3'UTRs play widespread, abundance-independent regulatory roles in stem cell differentiation.
  • Intermolecular 3'UTR interactions are critical for forming functional transcriptional regulator units during protein biogenesis.
  • These interactions are essential for the full activity of transcriptional regulators, impacting developmental pathways like Wnt signaling.