The SR protein family: pleiotropic functions in pre-mRNA splicing

A family of proteins with arginine-serine-rich domains has recently come into the limelight of studies on the mechanisms of constitutive and regulated pre-mRNA splicing. Implicated in an ever increasing variety of functions, these proteins act as driving forces during spliceosome assembly and also play decisive roles in alternative splice-site selection, suggesting that they are crucial players in the regulation of splicing during cell differentiation and development.