Noncoding RNAs in human health and diseases

Noncoding ribonucleic acids (RNAs) regulate gene expression at the transcriptional and posttranscriptional levels. Noncoding RNAs are involved in epigenetic processes and play crucial roles in histone modification, deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) methylation, and gene silencing. Here, we have described the synthesis and functions of noncoding RNAs for example microRNAs, siRNAs, PIWI-RNAs, long noncoding RNAs, circular RNAs and enhancer RNAs in health and disease. Moreover, alterations in the expression levels of noncoding RNAs lead to phenotypes of many life-threatening diseases such as diabetes and cancer. These roles of noncoding RNAs could be utilized to target genes or pathways causing diseases. Targeting noncoding RNAs can be one of the future safe strategies in the management of diabetes mellitus that could be utilized in drug development and pharma industries in near future. In this chapter, the authors have focused on the biology of various types of ncRNAs in health and disease.