Аннотация:Human telomerase RNA (hTR) is synthesized by RNA polymerase II from its own promoter as a long precursor. Multiple forms of telomerase RNA that differ at 3’-end were identified but precise position of the transcription stop of pre-hTR remains unknown. The mature form of hTR is produced by 3'-end truncation and 5'-end modification with a trimethylguanosine (TMG) cap. Expression of polyadenylated hTR-transcript from CMV-, CAG- and PGK-promoters led to accumulation of unprocessed form of hTR. The insertion of U1-terminator just after hTR also inhibited hTR processing. hTR containing various sequences at 3’-end of hTR expressed from polymerase II and polymerase III promoters were processed to different extend. These data and recent investigation of the role of H/ACA domain in telomerase RNA maturation indicate that formation of RNP complex at H/ACA domain is crucial for correct hTR processing. However, the question remains whether hTR maturation involves endonuclease cleavage of primary transcript or it is processed by 3’-end exonucleolytic trimming as in classical snoRNAs.
To discriminate between these possibilities we have decided to exploit stable cell lines in which RNA from the construction containing the sequence of mature hTR (451nt) with the flanking 424 nt of the 3’-genomic sequence followed by fluorescent protein coding region with IRES-element is expressed from polymerase II promoter. Our data suggest that hTR 3’-end processing is initiated by endonuclease cleavage.