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. 1995 Jul 3;14(13):3226–3235. doi: 10.1002/j.1460-2075.1995.tb07325.x

Experimental evidence for RNA trans-splicing in mammalian cells.

J Eul 1, M Graessmann 1, A Graessmann 1
PMCID: PMC394384  PMID: 7542587

Abstract

We present evidence that mammalian cells have the ability to generate functional mRNA molecules by trans-splicing. Rat cells, transformed by an early SV40 DNA fragment (Bst/Bam) synthesize a truncated T antigen (T1 antigen), although the cells do not have a direct sequence homology for the T1 antigen at the DNA level. The Bst/Bam DNA fragment encodes exclusively for the second SV40 T antigen exon (aa 83-708) and contains the entire small t antigen intron. To synthesize the corresponding mRNA (T1 mRNA), the cells utilize a cryptic 5' splice site within the second exon (codons for aa 131/132) as donor site and the upstream small t antigen 3' splice site as the acceptor site. Since these sites are in an inverted order on the pre-mRNA, two Bst/Bam transcripts are required to generate one T1 mRNA molecule. HeLa cell nuclear extracts also performed the trans-splicing reaction in vitro.

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