‘Jumping DNA’ plays vital role in regulating human neurons: Study

LONDON: A study has discovered that the ‘Jumping DNA’, also known as the Transposable elements (TEs) plays a significant role in regulating human neurons.

The jumping genes are the DNA sequences that move from one location on the genome to another. The fact that roughly half of the human genome is made up of TEs. The transposable elements play a significant role in influencing the development of the human brain.

They do this by teaming up with two specialized proteins from the family of proteins known as “Krüppel-associated box-containing zinc finger proteins, or KZFPs.

Last year, a study found that KZFPs regulate tamed the regulatory activity of transposable elements in the first few days of the fetus’s life. However, these regulatory sequences were subsequently re-ignited to orchestrate the development and function of adult organs.

Scientists identified two KZFPs as explicit to primates and found that they are expressed in explicit areas of the human developing and adult brain. They further observed that these proteins kept controlling transposable elements’ activity– at any rate in neurons and brain organoids cultured in the lab.

Therefore, these two KZFPs influenced the differentiation and neurotransmission profile of neurons, as well as protecting these cells against inflammatory responses that were otherwise triggered if their target transposable elements were left to be expressed.