The Human Transcriptome: An Unfinished Story
Open Access
- 29 June 2012
- Vol. 3 (3), 344-360
- https://doi.org/10.3390/genes3030344
Abstract
Despite recent technological advances, the study of the human transcriptome is still in its early stages. Here we provide an overview of the complex human transcriptomic landscape, present the bioinformatics challenges posed by the vast quantities of transcriptomic data, and discuss some of the studies that have tried to determine how much of the human genome is transcribed. Recent evidence has suggested that more than 90% of the human genome is transcribed into RNA. However, this view has been strongly contested by groups of scientists who argued that many of the observed transcripts are simply the result of transcriptional noise. In this review, we conclude that the full extent of transcription remains an open question that will not be fully addressed until we decipher the complete range and biological diversity of the transcribed genomic sequences.This publication has 114 references indexed in Scilit:
- lncRNAs: Finding the Forest Among the Trees?Molecular Therapy, 2011
- Transcript assembly and quantification by RNA-Seq reveals unannotated transcripts and isoform switching during cell differentiationNature Biotechnology, 2010
- Pervasive transcription constitutes a new level of eukaryotic genome regulationEMBO Reports, 2009
- Evolution and Functions of Long Noncoding RNAsCell, 2009
- Highly Integrated Single-Base Resolution Maps of the Epigenome in ArabidopsisCell, 2008
- Identification and analysis of functional elements in 1% of the human genome by the ENCODE pilot projectNature, 2007
- Finishing the euchromatic sequence of the human genomeNature, 2004
- Analysis of the mouse transcriptome based on functional annotation of 60,770 full-length cDNAsNature, 2002
- BLAT—The BLAST-Like Alignment ToolGenome Research, 2002
- Initial sequencing and analysis of the human genomeNature, 2001