Bioinformatic analysis of post-transcriptional regulation of endoplasmic reticulum stress genes by alternative polyadenylation and microRNA

Background: Various post-transcriptional regulation processes modulate the Endoplasmic reticulum stress response. Alternative polyadenylation is one post-transcriptional regulatory mechanism that generates a transcript with an alternate 3'end. The transcript with different 3'UTR is differentially modulated by various cis-regulatory elements and miRNAs. Aim : Present work aims to characterise CPE in 16 ER stress-associated genes. Results : Canonical AAUAAA PAS is present in 13 out of a total of 24 sites (53%). Alternative polyadenylation was found in five genes (HSPA5, HSPA9, ATF6, SHQ1, and VLDLR) in NCBI and EST databases. Further in silico analysis was done using computational tools as well as experimentally validated databases to find out miRNAs that target the ER stress-associated genes. Significance : The information about the alternative polyadenylation and the microRNA sites in the ER stress-associated genes might be useful for further study of the regulation of ER stress response and its associated molecular and pathological processes.