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Whisper mutations: cryptic messages within the genetic code

Oncogene volume 35, pages 3753–3759 (2016)Cite this article

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Abstract

Recent years have seen a great expansion in our understandings of how silent mutations can drive a disease and that mRNAs are not only mere messengers between the genome and the encoded proteins but also encompass regulatory activities. This review focuses on how silent mutations within open reading frames can affect the functional properties of the encoded protein. We describe how mRNAs exert control of cell biological processes governed by the encoded proteins via translation kinetics, protein folding, mRNA stability, spatio-temporal protein expression and by direct interactions with cellular factors. These examples illustrate how additional levels of information lie within the coding sequences and that the degenerative genetic code is not redundant and have co-evolved with the encoded proteins. Hence, so called synonymous mutations are not always silent but ‘whisper’.

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Acknowledgements

Equipe Labellisée La ligue contre le cancer, ECOS-Sud Program Cooperation France-Uruguay, ECOS-Nord Program Cooperation France-Mexico, Inserm and the project MEYS—NPS I—LO1413.

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  1. R Fåhraeus, M Marin and V Olivares-Illana: These authors contributed equally to this work.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Équipe Labellisée Ligue Contre le Cancer, INSERM UMRS1162, Institut de Génétique Moléculaire, Université Paris 7, IUH Hôpital St Louis, Paris, France

    R Fåhraeus

  2. RECAMO, Masaryk Memorial Cancer Institute, Zluty kopec 7, Brno, Czech Republic

    R Fåhraeus

  3. Sección Biquímica, Instituto de Biología, Facultad de Ciencias, Universidad de la República, Montevideo, Uruguay

    M Marin

  4. Instituto de Física, Universidad Autónoma de San Luis Potosí, San Luis Potosí, México

    V Olivares-Illana

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  1. R Fåhraeus
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Correspondence to R Fåhraeus, M Marin or V Olivares-Illana.

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Fåhraeus, R., Marin, M. & Olivares-Illana, V. Whisper mutations: cryptic messages within the genetic code. Oncogene 35, 3753–3759 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1038/onc.2015.454

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