Bioinformatics prediction of novel microRNAs located encoded by the N-Ras gene

Ras signaling is an important intracellular signaling pathway that is key regulator of several aspects of normal cell growth and malignant transformation. The RAS gene family consists of three small G proteins; H-Ras, N-Ras, and K-Ras that play a central role in cell signaling for growth, proliferation, and migration. Mutation of the Ras oncogenes creates the malignant properties that are needed for cancer to grow and spread. MicroRNAs (miRNAs) that are encoded within the Ras genes might also have roles in cancer development. Here, novel microRNAs located in the human N-Ras gene were bioinformatically predicted. SSC profiler program was utilized to predict the stem-loop structures within the genomic area of interest. UCSC genome browser database was useed to analyze the conservation status of the putative miRNA and its precursor sequence. Furthermore, the N-Ras-miRs prediction was also performed by using MatureBayes online tool. In addition, RNAFOLD online software which applies the minimum-free energy (MFE) RNA structure prediction algorithm, was used for approximate prediction of the stem-loop structure. Our results demonstrate that N-Ras with about 5Kb length has some predicted miRNA stem-loop-like structures that have relatively conserved sequences. Overall, accumulative pieces of evidence indicated the presence of novel miRNAs encoded within the N-Ras oncogene.