Natriuretic Peptide Precursor A (NPPA)

Mammalian transcriptome contains a large proportion of diverse and structurally complex noncoding RNAs. One class of such RNAs, natural antisense transcripts (NATs), are derived from the opposite strand of many protein-coding genes. Although the exact structure and functional relevance of most of the NATs is unknown, their emerging role as gene expression regulators raises the hypothesis that NATs might contribute to development of complex human disorders. a specific NPPA-AS isoform is capable of down-regulating the intron-retained NPPA mRNA variant. results demonstrate functional interaction of NPPA-AS with NPPA at the RNA level and suggest that antisense transcription might be an important post-transcriptional mechanism modulating NPPA expression.