The human ERas gene has an upstream premature polyadenylation signal that results in a truncated, non-coding transcript

¹ Wisconsin National Primate Research Center, Madison, Wisconsin
² University of Wisconsin-Madison Medical School, Madison, Wisconsin

^* To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: thomson{at}primate.wisc.edu.

	Abstract

The ERas gene is expressed in mouse ES cells and promotes their in vitro proliferation and tumorigenicity. We analyzed the expression of the human ERas gene in human ES cells by RT-PCR and SAGE analyses, but could not detect a full-length coding transcript. Sequence analysis predicted a premature polyadenylation signal for the human ERas transcript, and which we confirmed by 3' RACE analysis. By RT-PCR, we identified a truncated non-coding transcript in human ES cells that is down regulation during differentiation, suggesting conserved tissue specificity of the promoter region. Previous reports and EST databases indicate that orthologues of this gene are expressed in other mammals including the mouse, dog, and cow, which suggests that it became a silenced pseudogene relatively recently in mammalian evolution. In addition to the premature polyadenylation site, both the human and chimpanzee ERas genes include typical Alu-S retrotransposon insertions which could also influence expression at this locus. The lack of ERas expression in human ES cells suggests that they could have significantly different tumorigenic properties than mouse ES cells.

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