title: Biological functions of natural antisense transcripts.
abstract: In theory, the human genome is large enough to keep its roughly 20,000 genes well separated. In practice, genes are clustered; even more puzzling, in many cases both DNA strands of a protein coding gene are transcribed. The resulting natural antisense transcripts can be a blessing and curse, as many appreciate, or simply transcriptional trash, as others believe. Widespread evolutionary conservation, as recently demonstrated, is a good indicator for potential biological functions of natural antisense transcripts.
authors.affiliation: RNA Interest Group, Institute for Cell and Molecular Biosciences, Newcastle University, Framlington Place, Newcastle upon Tyne, UK. Andreas.werner@ncl.ac.uk
authors.forename: Andreas
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Werner
mesh_terms: D006801:Humans; D016376:Oligonucleotides, Antisense / Q000235:genetics*; D012333:RNA, Messenger / Q000235:genetics / Q000502:physiology*
chemical_list: D016376:Oligonucleotides, Antisense; D012333:RNA, Messenger