UCSF

Eukaryotic mRNAs must undergo a diverse set of complex processing events before the messages that they carry can be competent for translation. Each of these stages in the life of an mRNA represent potential opportunities for regulating the fate of a message. In this work we have explored the relationship between changing cellular needs, induced by alterations in environmental conditions, and the process of splicing. Across a wide range of different environmental contexts we see evidence of rapid, transcript-specific changes in splicing efficiency. The splicing of transcripts can be both up-regulated and down-regulated in response to environmental cues. In some cases large numbers of transcripts are affected, in others only defined subsets. In total, our data reveal that splicing is a remarkably dynamic and flexible mechanism for post-transcriptional gene regulation in yeast.