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Key Points Alternative splicing (AS) is a major contributor to transcriptome and proteome diversity. Evolutionary studies help to address questions that are fundamental to understanding this important process. The main mechanism for exon selection in higher eukaryotes is exon definition: the splicing machinery is placed across exons, constraining their length. Early eukaryotic ancestors are rich in introns, contain degenerate splicing signals and complex spliceosomes, and share homology of splicing factors in different species. These observations suggest an early eukaryotic origin of AS. There are three known evolutionary mechanisms that could account for the appearance of an alternatively spliced exon: exon shuffling (a form of gene duplication), exonization of intronic sequences and transition of a constitutive exon to an alternative exon. The formation of an alternative exon permits new functions to be established without eliminating the original function of the protein. Alu elements — primate-specific reteroelements — substantially contribute to the creation of new alternative exons, which can enhance the genomic repertoire. Defining an alternative exon enables understanding of how splicing affects genome evolution. Comparative studies show conservation that indicates functionality, and these studies can help to identify factors that are involved in exon definition. Recently, it was found that exons have increased nucleosome occupancy levels compared with introns; the nucleosome might act as a 'speed bump' on the exons, slowing RNA polymerase II. Exons were also found to be enriched in certain histone modifications. This nucleosome positioning in exons encourages the 'correct' location of molecular interactions across the exon, which contributes to the exon definition mechanism and suggests another level of complexity in eukaryotic splicing regulation. The detailed characterization of the genomes and transcriptomes of diverse species has enabled advances in our understanding of how alternative splicing and alternatively spliced genes have evolved. Evolutionary studies are also contributing insights into how exons are defined and how splicing is regulated. Over the past decade, it has been shown that alternative splicing (AS) is a major mechanism for the enhancement of transcriptome and proteome diversity, particularly in mammals. Splicing can be found in species from bacteria to humans, but its prevalence and characteristics vary considerably. Evolutionary studies are helping to address questions that are fundamental to understanding this important process: how and when did AS evolve? Which AS events are functional? What are the evolutionary forces that shaped, and continue to shape, AS? And what determines whether an exon is spliced in a constitutive or alternative manner? In this Review, we summarize the current knowledge of AS and evolution and provide insights into some of these unresolved questions.

Key Points Alternative splicing contributes significantly to human proteome complexity and explains the numerical disparity between the low number of human protein-coding genes and the number of human proteins. The appearance of multi-intron genes probably predates that of alternative splicing, and constitutive splicing probably predates exon skipping. Most of the higher eukaryotic organisms use alternative splicing, but some lower eukaryotes do not. Our understanding of the origins of alternative splicing has been limited until recently; however, two theories — one sequence based, the other trans -factor based — have now been proposed. Comparative analysis has recently provided important insights into the differences between alternative and constitutive sites, giving us hints about the steps involved in the evolution of alternative splicing. The 5′ splice site reveals major differences between unicellular organisms such as yeasts and multicellular organisms such as mammals. These differences indicate that three positions in the intronic portion of the 5′ss are less conserved in mammals than in yeasts, whereas the last three positions of the exon are more conserved. These differences are directly related to the plasticity of the 5′ splice sites of multicellular eukaryotes: 5′ss can be used in both constitutive and alternative splicing and for the regulation of the inclusion/skipping ratio in alternative splicing. Alternative splicing might have originated as a result of relaxation of 5′ splice site recognition in organisms that originally could support only constitutive splicing. Alternative splicing creates transcriptome diversification, possibly leading to speciation. A large fraction of the protein-coding genes of multicellular organisms are alternatively spliced, although no regulated splicing has been detected in unicellular eukaryotes such as yeasts. A comparative analysis of unicellular and multicellular eukaryotic 5′ splice sites has revealed important differences — the plasticity of the 5′ splice sites of multicellular eukaryotes means that these sites can be used in both constitutive and alternative splicing, and for the regulation of the inclusion/skipping ratio in alternative splicing. So, alternative splicing might have originated as a result of relaxation of the 5′ splice site recognition in organisms that originally could support only constitutive splicing.

Splicing and transcription have been argued to be coupled, but the mechanisms behind this are unclear. Published data sets examining nucleosome positioning are now analyzed and show that exons tend to have higher nucleosome occupancy than introns. This may indicate why metazoan exons are ∼150 nucleotides, similar to the length of DNA on a nucleosome. An increasing body of evidence indicates that transcription and splicing are coupled, and it is accepted that chromatin organization regulates transcription. Little is known about the cross-talk between chromatin structure and exon-intron architecture. By analysis of genome-wide nucleosome-positioning data sets from humans, flies and worms, we found that exons show increased nucleosome-occupancy levels with respect to introns, a finding that we link to differential GC content and nucleosome-disfavoring elements between exons and introns. Analysis of genome-wide chromatin immunoprecipitation data in humans and mice revealed four specific post-translational histone modifications enriched in exons. Our findings indicate that previously described enrichment of H3K36me3 modifications in exons reflects a more fundamental phenomenon, namely increased nucleosome occupancy along exons. Our results suggest an RNA polymerase II–mediated cross-talk between chromatin structure and exon-intron architecture, implying that exon selection may be modulated by chromatin structure.

How are short exonic sequences recognized within the vast intronic oceans in which they reside? Despite decades of research, this remains one of the most fundamental, yet enigmatic, questions in the field of pre‐mRNA splicing research. For many years, studies aiming to shed light on this process were focused at the RNA level, characterizing the manner by which splicing factors and auxiliary proteins interact with splicing signals, thereby enabling, facilitating and regulating splicing. However, we increasingly understand that splicing is not an isolated process; rather it occurs co‐transcriptionally and is presumably also regulated by transcription‐related processes. In fact, studies by our group and others over the past year suggest that DNA structure in terms of nucleosome positioning and specific histone modifications, which have a well established role in transcription, may also have a role in splicing. In this review we discuss evidence for the coupling between transcription and splicing, focusing on recent findings suggesting a link between chromatin structure and splicing, and highlighting challenges this emerging field is facing.

MicroRNA (miRNA) biogenesis initiates co-transcriptionally, but how the Microprocessor machinery pinpoints the locations of short precursor miRNA sequences within long flanking regions of the transcript is not known. Here we show that miRNA biogenesis depends on DNA methylation. When the regions flanking the miRNA coding sequence are highly methylated, the miRNAs are more highly expressed, have greater sequence conservation, and are more likely to drive cancer-related phenotypes than miRNAs encoded by unmethylated loci. We show that the removal of DNA methylation from miRNA loci leads to their downregulation. Further, we found that MeCP2 binding to methylated miRNA loci halts RNA polymerase II elongation, leading to enhanced processing of the primary miRNA by Drosha. Taken together, our data reveal that DNA methylation directly affects miRNA biogenesis. Long primary transcripts of microRNAs are co-transcriptionally cleaved by the enzyme Drosha. Here the authors suggest that DNA methylation in miRNA loci in mammalian cells increases Drosha binding, slowing RNA polymerase II elongation to enhance miRNA biogenesis.

In the earliest step of spliceosome assembly, the two splice sites flanking an intron are brought into proximity by U1 snRNP and U2AF along with other proteins. The mechanism that facilitates this intron looping is poorly understood. Using a CRISPR interference-based approach to halt RNA polymerase II transcription in the middle of introns in human cells, we discovered that the nascent 5′ splice site base pairs with a U1 snRNA that is tethered to RNA polymerase II during intron synthesis. This association functionally corresponds with splicing outcome, involves bona fide 5′ splice sites and cryptic intronic sites, and occurs transcriptome-wide. Overall, our findings reveal that the upstream 5′ splice sites remain attached to the transcriptional machinery during intron synthesis and are thus brought into proximity of the 3′ splice sites; potentially mediating the rapid splicing of long introns. We know that most splicing reactions take place co-transcriptionally, but how the transcription machinery facilitate splicing of introns is unknown. Here the authors show that the 5′ splice site remains associated with the transcription machinery during intron synthesis through U1 snRNP, providing a basis for the rapid splicing reaction of introns.

Familial Dysautonomia (FD) is an autosomal recessive congenital neuropathy that results from a point mutation at the 5' splice site of intron 20 in the IKBKAP gene. This mutation decreases production of the IKAP protein, and treatments that increase the level of the full-length IKBKAP transcript are likely to be of therapeutic value. We previously found that phosphatidylserine (PS), an FDA-approved food supplement, elevates IKAP levels in cells generated from FD patients. Here we demonstrate that combined treatment of cells generated from FD patients with PS and kinetin or PS and the histone deacetylase inhibitor trichostatin A (TSA) resulted in an additive elevation of IKAP compared to each drug alone. This indicates that the compounds influence different pathways. We also found that pridopidine enhances production of IKAP in cells generated from FD patients. Pridopidine has an additive effect on IKAP levels when used in combination with kinetin or TSA, but not with PS; suggesting that PS and pridopidine influence IKBKAP levels through the same mechanism. Indeed, we demonstrate that the effect of PS and pridopidine is through sigma-1 receptor-mediated activation of the BDNF signaling pathway. A combination treatment with any of these drugs with different mechanisms has potential to benefit FD patients.

Background Neurodevelopmental disorders, including autism spectrum disorder, involve widespread transcriptional dysregulation. Copy number variations at 16p11.2 are among the strongest genetic risk factors for autism spectrum disorder, yet the molecular mechanisms by which these copy number variations contribute to neurodevelopmental pathology remain unclear. Results We identify significant genetic associations between autism spectrum disorder susceptibility and the HIST1 histone gene cluster through genome-wide analysis. Transcriptomic profiling across post-mortem brain tissue, patient-derived neural progenitor cells, neurons, and cerebral organoids reveals consistent upregulation of linker histone variants H1.2 and H1.5 in idiopathic autism spectrum disorder and 16p11.2 hemi-deletion carriers, but not in schizophrenia or bipolar disorder. Functional assays demonstrate that dysregulated H1 expression disrupts gene networks involved in synaptic signaling, chromatin remodeling, and neural differentiation. Mechanistically, we link H1 upregulation to MAZ, a transcription factor encoded within the 16p11.2 locus. MAZ binds the promoter regions of H1 genes and represses their transcription. Knockdown of MAZ leads to H1 overexpression. H1 upregulation alone is sufficient to alter the expression of autism spectrum disorder-associated genes. Conclusions Our findings define a MAZ-dependent regulation of H1 dosage as a critical chromatin-mediated mechanism contributing to transcriptional pathology in 16p11.2-associated autism spectrum disorder.

Since the emergence of next-generation sequencing (NGS) technologies, great effort has been put into the development of tools for analysis of the short reads. In parallel, knowledge is increasing regarding biases inherent in these technologies. Here we discuss four different biases we encountered while analyzing various Illumina datasets. These biases are due to both biological and statistical effects that in particular affect comparisons between different genomic regions. Specifically, we encountered biases pertaining to the distributions of nucleotides across sequencing cycles, to mappability, to contamination of pre-mRNA with mRNA, and to non-uniform hydrolysis of RNA. Most of these biases are not specific to one analyzed dataset, but are present across a variety of datasets and within a variety of genomic contexts. Importantly, some of these biases correlated in a highly significant manner with biological features, including transcript length, gene expression levels, conservation levels, and exon-intron architecture, misleadingly increasing the credibility of results due to them. We also demonstrate the relevance of these biases in the context of analyzing an NGS dataset mapping transcriptionally engaged RNA polymerase II (RNAPII) in the context of exon-intron architecture, and show that elimination of these biases is crucial for avoiding erroneous interpretation of the data. Collectively, our results highlight several important pitfalls, challenges and approaches in the analysis of NGS reads.

PTB is a repressive splicing regulator. The effect of PTB knockdown in HeLa cells is now examined, indicating that similar to other recently examined factors, PTB variably affects splicing in a predictable fashion depending on where its binding site is relative to the target exon. To gain global insights into the role of the well-known repressive splicing regulator PTB, we analyzed the consequences of PTB knockdown in HeLa cells using high-density oligonucleotide splice-sensitive microarrays. The major class of identified PTB-regulated splicing event was PTB-repressed cassette exons, but there was also a substantial number of PTB-activated splicing events. PTB-repressed and PTB-activated exons showed a distinct arrangement of motifs with pyrimidine-rich motif enrichment within and upstream of repressed exons but downstream of activated exons. The N-terminal half of PTB was sufficient to activate splicing when recruited downstream of a PTB-activated exon. Moreover, insertion of an upstream pyrimidine tract was sufficient to convert a PTB-activated exon to a PTB-repressed exon. Our results show that PTB, an archetypal splicing repressor, has variable splicing activity that predictably depends upon its binding location with respect to target exons.