title: Tracking intron removal in real time.
abstract: Are all introns spliced cotranscriptionally? In a recent issue of Cell, Vargas et al. (2011) reported single-molecule analyses of pre-mRNA splicing, confirming transcription-coupled splicing of constitutive introns but finding off-site and delayed splicing of alternative introns. The results raise the question of whether kinetics distinguishes constitutive from regulated splicing.
authors.affiliation: Department of Medicine, Institute for Genomic Medicine, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, CA 92093-0651, USA.
authors.forename: Bruce A
authors.initials: BA
authors.lastname: Hamilton
authors.forename: Xiang-Dong
authors.initials: XD
authors.lastname: Fu