Relevance: Prelims: Science and technology
Why in news?
- Researchers from National Centre for Biological Sciences, Bengaluru, and SASTRA University, Thanjavur, have discovered how microRNAs are made in plants. This finding makes it much easier for studying processes in plants.
About:
- MicroRNAs are small molecules, about 21 nucleotides long, and help in controlling the levels of proteins in the cell.
- In order to decrease the level of a particular protein in specific cells, the microRNAs destroy the messenger RNA molecules that help with the production of that specific protein in the cell.
- The microRNA molecules do this by cutting down that particular messenger RNA thereby destroying it. This process is called the silencing of the messenger RNA.
- Similarly, the best way to study the effect of a gene in the DNA is to silence or “knockout” the gene. In knocking out processes, those RNA that induce the gene to produce proteins are destroyed or their levels are reduced by the microRNA as described earlier.
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