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Open reading frames (ORFs) are parts of a reading frame that contain no stop codons. A reading frame is a sequence of nucleotide triplets that are read as codons specifying amino acids; a single strand of DNA sequence has three possible reading frames. Long ORFs may indicate candidate protein coding regions in a DNA sequence.
Orphan transporters can be found in over 20 families in the SLC superfamily. Here, the authors show that human SLC22A10 is a unitary pseudogene due to a fixed missense mutation, P220; while in great apes, its orthologs transport sex steroid conjugates.
Identifying small proteins is challenging. ProTInSeq uses modified transposons to express markers inserted in-frame to protein-coding genes. This method identifies 153 unannotated small proteins in M. pneumoniae and additional proteomic information.
Yuhta Nomura and Naoshi Dohmae report the discovery of a small protein-coding gene that overlaps the tumor suppressor gene Scribble. Their data suggest that the overlapping gene, oSCRIB, limits the translation of downstream Scribble and may have important implications in cancer.
Translation reinitiation of open reading frames (ORFs) located after upstream ORFs is dependent on the DENR–MCT1 complex, which regulates a specific set of mRNAs.