of or pertaining to the transcription of two or more adjacent cistrons into a single messenger RNA molecule
Word origin
[1960–65; poly- + cistron + -ic]This word is first recorded in the period 1960–65. Other words that entered Englishat around the same time include: deinstitutionalize, disco, go-go, pop art, tag questionpoly- is a combining form with the meanings “much, many” and, in chemistry, “polymeric,”used in the formation of compound words. Other words that use the affix poly- include: polyandrous, polyculture, polyethylene; -ic is a suffix forming adjectives from other parts of speech, occurring originally inGreek and Latin loanwords (metallic; poetic; archaic; public) and, on this model, used as an adjective-forming suffix with the particular senses“having some characteristics of” (opposed to the simple attributive use of the basenoun) (balletic; sophomoric); “in the style of” (Byronic; Miltonic); “pertaining to a family of peoples or languages” (Finnic; Semitic; Turkic)
Examples of 'polycistronic' in a sentence
polycistronic
They were shown to be part of a polycistronic operon with other hyp genes.
Katherine L. Germane, Sanchao Liu, Elliot S. Gerlach, Alice M. Savage, RebeccaL. Renberg, Theresah N. K. Zu, Hong Dong, Scott D. Walck, Matthew D. Servinsky,Christian J. Sund 2018, 'Hydrogen-Cycling during Solventogenesis in Clostridium acetobutylicum American TypeCulture Collection (ATCC) 824 Requires the [NiFe]-Hydrogenase for Energy Conservation',Fermentationhttp://www.mdpi.com/2311-5637/4/3/55. Retrieved from DOAJ CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/legalcode)
Most are within mono- and polycistronic transcripts with no protein coding potential.
Paul D. Donovan, Markus S. Schröder, Desmond G. Higgins, Geraldine Butler 2016, 'Identification of Non-Coding RNAs in the Candida parapsilosis Species Group', PLOS ONE10.1371/journal.pone.0163235. Retrieved from PLOS CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/legalcode)
These organisms show very unusual mechanisms of gene expression, such as polycistronic transcription.
Myler Peter J, Hernández-Rivas Rosaura, Manning-Cela Rebeca G, Figueroa-Angulo ElisaE, Florencio-Martínez Luis E, Padilla-Mejía Norma E, Martínez-Calvillo Santiago 2009, 'Gene organization and sequence analyses of transfer RNA genes in Trypanosomatid parasites',BMC Genomicshttp://www.biomedcentral.com/1471-2164/10/232. Retrieved from DOAJ CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/legalcode)
Variable ribosome density profiles of polycistronic transcripts correlate strongly with differential translation patterns.
Tessa E.F. Quax, Yuri I. Wolf, Jasper J. Koehorst, Omri Wurtzel, Richard van der Oost,Wenqi Ran, Fabian Blombach, Kira S. Makarova, Stan J.J. Brouns, Anthony C. Forster,E. Gerhart H. Wagner, Rotem Sorek, Eugene V. Koonin, John van der Oost 2013, 'Differential Translation Tunes Uneven Production of Operon-Encoded Proteins', Cell Reportshttp://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2211124713004117. Retrieved from DOAJ CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/legalcode)
We show that polycistronic transcription may interfere with expression of the downstream tandem gene.
Sean P Gordon, Elizabeth Tseng, Asaf Salamov, Jiwei Zhang, Xiandong Meng, ZhiyingZhao, Dongwan Kang, Jason Underwood, Igor V Grigoriev, Melania Figueroa, JonathanS Schilling, Feng Chen, Zhong Wang 2015, 'Widespread Polycistronic Transcripts in Fungi Revealed by Single-Molecule mRNA Sequencing.',PLoS ONEhttp://europepmc.org/articles/PMC4503453?pdf=render. Retrieved from PLOS CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/legalcode)
Alternative initiation strategies by ribosomal frameshifting and leaky scanning enable polycistronic translation of the cap-dependent viral transcript.
Boris-Lawrie Kathleen, Bolinger Cheryl 2009, 'Mechanisms employed by retroviruses to exploit host factors for translational controlof a complicated proteome', Retrovirologyhttp://www.retrovirology.com/content/6/1/8. Retrieved from DOAJ CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/legalcode)
In polycistronic regions, splicing occurs via the classical pathway, as well as by nested and recursive splicing.
Paul D. Donovan, Markus S. Schröder, Desmond G. Higgins, Geraldine Butler 2016, 'Identification of Non-Coding RNAs in the Candida parapsilosis Species Group', PLOS ONE10.1371/journal.pone.0163235. Retrieved from PLOS CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/legalcode)
Eukaryotic polycistronic transcription units are rare and only a few examples are known, mostly being the outcome of serendipitous discovery.
Guy Shahaf, Dorit Shweiki 2014, 'Nonsense-mediated mRNA decay immunity can help identify human polycistronic transcripts.',PLoS ONEhttp://europepmc.org/articles/PMC3951408?pdf=render. Retrieved from PLOS CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/legalcode)
More than half of the protein-coding genes in bacteria are organized in polycistronicoperons composed of two or more genes.
Jing Zhao, Hong Zhang, Bo Qin, Rainer Nikolay, Qing-Yu He, Christian M. T. Spahn,Gong Zhang 2019, 'Multifaceted Stoichiometry Control of Bacterial Operons Revealed by Deep ProteomeQuantification', Frontiers in Geneticshttps://www.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fgene.2019.00473/full. Retrieved from DOAJ CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/legalcode)
Chloroplasts contain their own genome, organized as operons, which are generally transcribed as polycistronic transcriptional units.
Eva M. del Campo 2009, 'Post-Transcriptional Control of Chloroplast Gene Expression', Gene Regulation and Systems Biologyhttp://www.la-press.com/post-transcriptional-control-of-chloroplast-gene-expression-a1351. Retrieved from DOAJ CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/legalcode)