I am happy this is finally out. It was a long journey which started with a few interesting results at the end of my PhD and led – by others – to a new model of #RiboRegulation of nuclear import.
I thank the Choder lab and the many collaborators who helped bring this project to fruition!

The cool result – the NLS on the tail is indeed obscured by RNA and prevents it’s import.
That’s #RiboRegulation – a termed coined by Matthias Hentze to describe cases where RNA regulates the function of a protein.
Our model is that decapped mRNA is bound both at the active site and the tail, obscuring the NLS. As the mRNA is degraded, the mRNA gets shorter, finally revealing the NLS, allowing it to be identified by the karyopherin and import Xrn1 to the nucleus.

📣 💥 It took almost 12 years, but the final paper from my PhD is finally published @naturecomms
It is titled “RNA-controlled nucleocytoplasmic shuttling of mRNA decay factors regulates mRNA synthesis and a novel mRNA decay pathway” but the somewhat dry title hides a novel nuclear import mechanism that we discovered.
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-022-34417-z

A 🧵:

#mRNA #mRNADegradation #GeneExpression #yeast #nucleus #NuclearImport #RiboRegulation