Zhang Zheyu, Wang Zefeng
CAS Key Laboratory of Computational Biology, Biomed Big Data Center, Shanghai Institute of Nutrition and Health, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai 200031, China.
Shool of Life Science, Southern University of Science and Technology, Shenzhen 518055, China.
Acta Biochim Biophys Sin (Shanghai). 2024 Dec 24;57(1):157-168. doi: 10.3724/abbs.2024241.
Circular RNAs (circRNAs) have emerged as a large class of stable and conserved RNAs that are derived primarily from back-splicing of pre-mRNAs and expressed in a cell- and tissue-specific fashion. Recent studies have indicated that a subset of circRNAs may undergo translation through cap-independent pathways mediated by internal ribosome entry sites (IRESs), m6A modifications, or IRES-like short elements. Considering the stability and low immunogenicity of circRNAs, transcribed circRNAs hold great promise in biomedical applications. In this review, we briefly discuss the noncoding and coding functions of circRNAs in cells, as well as the methods for the synthesis of circRNAs and current advances in the applications of circRNAs in biomedicine.
环状RNA（circRNAs）已成为一大类稳定且保守的RNA，主要来源于前体mRNA的反向剪接，并以细胞和组织特异性方式表达。最近的研究表明，一部分circRNAs可能通过由内部核糖体进入位点（IRESs）、m6A修饰或IRES样短元件介导的不依赖帽的途径进行翻译。鉴于circRNAs的稳定性和低免疫原性，转录的circRNAs在生物医学应用中具有巨大潜力。在本综述中，我们简要讨论了circRNAs在细胞中的非编码和编码功能，以及circRNAs的合成方法和circRNAs在生物医学应用中的当前进展。
