Long Non-Coding RNA Molecules Necessary to Regulate Differentiation of Embryonic Stem Cells Into Cardiac Cells, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Study

When the human genome was sequenced, biologists were surprised to find that very little of the genome—less than 3 percent—corresponds to protein-coding genes. What, they wondered, was all the rest of that DNA doing? It turns out that much of it codes for genetic snippets known as long non-coding RNAs, or lncRNAs. In recent years, scientists have found that these molecules often help to regulate which genes get turned on or off inside a cell. However, little is known about the specific roles of the thousands of lncRNAs discovered so far.

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