TY - JOUR AU - St Laurent, Georges AU - Shtokalo, Dmitry AU - Tackett, Michael R. AU - Yang, Zhaoqing AU - Eremina, Tatyana AU - Wahlestedt, Claes AU - Urcuqui-Inchima, Silvio AU - Seilheimer, Bernd AU - McCaffrey, Timothy A. AU - Kapranov, Philipp PY - 2012 DA - 2012/09/24 TI - Intronic RNAs constitute the major fraction of the non-coding RNA in mammalian cells JO - BMC Genomics SP - 504 VL - 13 IS - 1 AB - The function of RNA from the non-coding (the so called “dark matter”) regions of the genome has been a subject of considerable recent debate. Perhaps the most controversy is regarding the function of RNAs found in introns of annotated transcripts, where most of the reads that map outside of exons are usually found. However, it has been reported that the levels of RNA in introns are minor relative to those of the corresponding exons, and that changes in the levels of intronic RNAs correlate tightly with that of adjacent exons. This would suggest that RNAs produced from the vast expanse of intronic space are just pieces of pre-mRNAs or excised introns en route to degradation. SN - 1471-2164 UR - https://doi.org/10.1186/1471-2164-13-504 DO - 10.1186/1471-2164-13-504 ID - St Laurent2012 ER -