Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

  • Brief Communication
  • Published:

Diversity of microRNAs in human and chimpanzee brain

Nature Genetics volume 38, pages 1375–1377 (2006)Cite this article

Abstract

We used massively parallel sequencing to compare the microRNA (miRNA) content of human and chimpanzee brains, and we identified 447 new miRNA genes. Many of the new miRNAs are not conserved beyond primates, indicating their recent origin, and some miRNAs seem species specific, whereas others are expanded in one species through duplication events. These data suggest that evolution of miRNAs is an ongoing process and that along with ancient, highly conserved miRNAs, there are a number of emerging miRNAs.

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution

Access options

Buy this article

  • Purchase on Springer Link
  • Instant access to full article PDF
Buy now

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

Figure 1: Human and chimpanzee small RNA libraries.
Figure 2: miRNA cloning frequency and conservation.

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  1. Bartel, D.P. Cell 116, 281–297 (2004).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  2. Alvarez-Garcia, I. & Miska, E.A. Development 132, 4653–4662 (2005).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  3. Griffiths-Jones, S., Grocock, R.J., van Dongen, S., Bateman, A. & Enright, A.J. Nucleic Acids Res. 34, D140–D144 (2006).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  4. Bentwich, I. et al. Nat. Genet. 37, 766–770 (2005).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  5. Berezikov, E. et al. Cell 120, 21–24 (2005).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  6. Margulies, M. et al. Nature 437, 376–380 (2005).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  7. Vagin, V.V. et al. Science 313, 320–324 (2006).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  8. Stein, A.J., Fuchs, G., Fu, C., Wolin, S.L. & Reinisch, K.M. Cell 121, 529–537 (2005).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  9. Bonnet, E., Wuyts, J., Rouze, P. & Van de Peer, Y. Bioinformatics 20, 2911–2917 (2004).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  10. Aravin, A. & Tuschl, T. FEBS Lett. 579, 5830–5840 (2005).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  11. Allen, E. et al. Nat. Genet. 36, 1282–1290 (2004).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  12. Enard, W. et al. Science 296, 340–343 (2002).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  13. Schratt, G.M. et al.Nature 439, 283–289 (2006).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  14. Ashraf, S.I., McLoon, A.L., Sclarsic, S.M. & Kunes, S. Cell 124, 191–205 (2006).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  15. Muotri, A.R. & Gage, F.H. Nature 441, 1087–1093 (2006).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgements

We thank the various genome sequencing consortia (see Supplementary Methods for full references) for sharing sequence information through Ensembl (http://www.ensembl.org) before publication and thank C. Reijmer (Vrelinghuis, Medical Center Biltstraat, Utrecht) for providing tissue material. This work was supported by grants from the Horizon (E.B.) and BioRange (E.C.) programs of the Netherlands Genomics Initiative, and a TOP grant (R.H.A.P.) from the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Hubrecht Laboratory–KNAW, Uppsalalaan 8, Utrecht, 3584, CT, The Netherlands

    Eugene Berezikov, Linda W van Laake, Edwin Cuppen & Ronald H A Plasterk

  2. Vertis Biotechnologie AG, Lise-Meitner-Strasse 30, Freising-Weihenstephan, D-85354, Germany

    Fritz Thuemmler

  3. Department of Cardiology, University Medical Center Utrecht, Utrecht, 3508, GA, The Netherlands

    Linda W van Laake

  4. Biomedical Primate Research Centre, Lange Kleiweg 139, Rijswijk, The Netherlands

    Ivanela Kondova & Ronald Bontrop

Authors
  1. Eugene Berezikov
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Fritz Thuemmler
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Linda W van Laake
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  4. Ivanela Kondova
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  5. Ronald Bontrop
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  6. Edwin Cuppen
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  7. Ronald H A Plasterk
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Contributions

This study was designed by R.H.A.P., E.C. and E.B.; L.W.L. prepared human tissues; I.K. and R.B. prepared chimpanzee tissues; F.T. generated libraries; E.B. performed the analysis and wrote a first draft of the paper; E.B., E.C. and R.H.A.P. wrote the paper and I.K., R.B. and F.T. contributed critical comments on the manuscript.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Ronald H A Plasterk.

Ethics declarations

Competing interests

F.T. is founder and Chief Executive Officer of Vertis Biotechnologie AG. Publication of this work may result in an increase in the level of awareness of its services for cloning and analysis of microRNAs.

E.B., E.C. and R.P. are the inventors on a patent application that includes novel miRNA sequences described in this manuscript. This publication may affect the value of this patent.

Supplementary information

Supplementary Fig. 1

Distribution of read densities across the chimpanzee genome. (PDF 140 kb)

Supplementary Table 1

Strand distribution for repeat-derived reads. (PDF 84 kb)

Supplementary Table 2

Sequences of novel human and chimpanzee miRNAs. (PDF 279 kb)

Supplementary Table 3

miRNA families containing novel miRNAs (PDF 64 kb)

Supplementary Table 4

Clusters containing novel human and chimpanzee miRNAs. (PDF 139 kb)

Supplementary Table 5

miRNAs duplicated in human or chimpanzee genomes. (PDF 99 kb)

Supplementary Methods (PDF 494 kb)

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Berezikov, E., Thuemmler, F., van Laake, L. et al. Diversity of microRNAs in human and chimpanzee brain. Nat Genet 38, 1375–1377 (2006). https://doi.org/10.1038/ng1914

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/ng1914

This article is cited by

Search

Advanced search

Quick links

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing