An imbalance in the synthesis of ribosomal proteins can lead to the disruption of various cellular processes. For mammalian cells, it has been shown that the level of the eukaryote-specific ribosomal protein eL29, also known as the one interacting with heparin/heparan sulfate, substantially affects their growth. Moreover, in animals lacking this protein, a number of anatomical abnormalities have been observed. Here, we applied next-generation RNA sequencing to HEK293 cells transfected with siRNAs specific for the mRNA of eL29 to determine what changes occur in the transcriptome profile with a decrease in the level of the target protein. We showed that an approximately 2.5-fold decrease in the content of eL29 leads to statistically significant changes in the expression of more than a thousand genes at the transcription level, without a noticeable effect on cell viability, rRNA level, and global translation. The set of eL29-dependent genes included both up-regulated and down-regulated ones, among which there are those previously identified as targets for proteins implicated in oncogenesis. Thus, our findings demonstrate that an insufficiency of eL29 in mammalian cells causes a significant reorganization of gene expression, thereby highlighting the relationship between the cellular balance of eL29 and the activities of certain genes.
The protein eL38 is one of the smallest proteins of the mammalian ribosome, which is a component of its large (60S) subunit. The haploinsufficiency of eL38 in mice leads to the Tail-short mutant phenotype characterized by defects in the development of the axial skeleton caused by the poor translation of mRNA subsets of Hox genes. Using the ribosome profiling assay applied to HEK293 cells knocked down of eL38, we examined the effects of the lack of eL38 in 60S subunits on gene expression at the level of translation. A four-fold decrease in the cell content of eL38 was shown to result in significant changes in the translational efficiencies of 150 genes. Among the genes, whose expression at the level of translation was enhanced, there were mainly those associated with basic metabolic processes; namely, translation, protein folding, chromosome organization, splicing, and others. The set of genes with reduced translation efficiencies contained those that are mostly involved in the processes related to the regulation of transcription, including the activation of Hox genes. Thus, we demonstrated that eL38 insufficiency significantly affects the expression of certain genes at the translational level. Our findings facilitate understanding the possible causes of some anomalies in eL38-deficient animals.
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