title: Artificial microRNAs (amiRNAs) engineering - On how microRNA-based silencing methods have affected current plant silencing research.
abstract: In recent years, endogenous microRNAs have been described as important regulators of gene expression in eukaryotes. Artificial microRNAs (amiRNAs) represent a recently developed miRNA-based strategy to silence endogenous genes. amiRNAs can be created by exchanging the miRNA/miRNA(∗) sequence within a miRNA precursor with a sequence designed to match the target gene, this is possible as long as the secondary RNA structure of the precursor is kept intact. In this review, we summarize the basic methodologies to design amiRNAs and detail their applications in plants genetic functional studies as well as their potential for crops genetic improvement.
authors.affiliation: Key Lab of Horticultural Plant Biology (MOE), Huazhong Agricultural University, Shizishan, Wuhan 430070, China. sablokg@gmail.com
authors.forename: Gaurav
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Sablok
authors.forename: Alvaro L
authors.initials: AL
authors.lastname: Pérez-Quintero
authors.forename: Mehedi
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Hassan
authors.forename: Tatiana V
authors.initials: TV
authors.lastname: Tatarinova
authors.forename: Camilo
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: López
mesh_terms: D018556:Crops, Agricultural / Q000235:genetics*; D018506:Gene Expression Regulation, Plant; D020868:Gene Silencing; D005818:Genetic Engineering; D035683:MicroRNAs / Q000235:genetics*; D010944:Plants / Q000235:genetics* / Q000276:immunology; D030821:Plants, Genetically Modified / Q000235:genetics*; D014170:Transformation, Genetic
chemical_list: D035683:MicroRNAs