Abstract
Circular RNA (circRNA) is a novel class of non-coding RNA generated by pre-mRNA back splicing, which is characterized by a closed-loop structure. Although circRNAs were firstly reported decades ago, their regulatory roles have not been discovered until recently. In this review, we discussed the putative biogenesis pathways and regulatory functions of circRNAs. Recent studies showed that circRNAs are abundant in skeletal muscle tissue, and their expression levels are regulated during muscle development and aging. We, thus, characterized the expression profile of circRNAs in skeletal muscle and discussed regulatory functions and mechanism-of-action of specific circRNAs in myogenesis. The future investigation into the roles of circRNAs in both physiological and pathological conditions may provide novel insights in skeletal muscle development and provide new therapeutic strategies for muscular diseases.
Highlights
The skeletal muscle is the largest organ in animals, which constitutes 30~–50% of the body mass.Skeletal muscle plays an important role in locomotion and metabolism
Many transcription factors are involved in regulating the activity of myogenic stem cells and among which the most important regulator is called muscle regulated factors (MRF), including Myod, myf5, myogenein and Mrf4
MiRNAs bind to their target mRNAs and negatively regulate mRNA stability or protein Recent reports have demonstrated that thousands of circRNAs harbor miRNA binding sites, indicating production
Summary
The skeletal muscle is the largest organ in animals, which constitutes 30~–50% of the body mass. Proper muscle growth and homeostasis are the critical determinants of human motor performance. Numerous experiments have established that the development and growth of skeletal muscle mainly rely on the proliferation and differentiation of myogenic stem cells. Despite the above essential protein-encoding genes, abundant research in recent years has focused on non-coding RNAs, such as microRNA and long-non coding RNAs, which have important regulatory roles in skeletal muscle growth and development [8]. Accumulated evidence has revealed that circRNAs are evolutionally conserved and their expression levels are tissue and developmental stage-specific, indicating that circRNAs can have regulatory functions [12,13]. Recent studies reveal that circRNAs are abundant in skeletal muscles and global expression levels of circRNAs dynamically change during myoblasts differentiation [14,15]. We highlight recent advances in our understanding of circRNAs biogenesis and expression in skeletal muscle, with a particular focus on their functions and mechanisms in myogenesis
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