The Central Dogma of molecular biology is that DNA makes RNA, and RNA makes protein. This doesn't explicitly state that there's a 1:1 dependency between these things, but it kind of implies it. This paper describes a discovery that in Octopuses, sufficiently low temperatures trigger modification of the RNA before it's used as a template for protein production. The paper identifies cases where this results in modification to a protein involved in microtubule transport and a protein involved in ion transport in synapses, both plausible scenarios where you may want different properties in different thermodynamic situations.<p>This is both very neat and very irritating! It's a lovely result where there's apparent demonstration of a complex mechanism producing an intuitive result, but it's also another case where just having the DNA sequence doesn't tell you what's actually happening in the cell. Biology is complicated.
For those also wondering what this means:<p>The statement "Temperature-dependent RNA editing in octopus recodes the neural proteome" refers to a phenomenon observed in octopuses where RNA editing, a process that alters the genetic information carried by RNA molecules, is influenced by temperature. This temperature-dependent RNA editing leads to changes in the neural proteome, which refers to the entire set of proteins expressed in the nervous system of an organism.<p>RNA editing is a post-transcriptional modification process that can change the nucleotide sequence of RNA molecules. In octopuses, this editing process occurs in a temperature-dependent manner, meaning that the extent or pattern of RNA editing varies depending on the temperature to which the octopus is exposed.<p>As a result of temperature-dependent RNA editing, the genetic information encoded in the RNA molecules is altered, leading to changes in the proteins produced by the octopus's nervous system. This has implications for the functioning and adaptability of the neural proteome, potentially affecting neural processes such as signal transmission, synaptic plasticity, or neural development.<p>Overall, this statement highlights an intriguing aspect of octopus biology, indicating that environmental factors such as temperature can influence the RNA editing process and subsequently impact the composition of the proteins in the octopus's nervous system.
We've known for a few years that cephalopods edit most of their mRNA (like 60% or so) to change the protein that's made. So this result isn't super surprising to the field. This is very much an example of epitranscriptomics, along with it's eponymous relative epigenetics, shows sophisticated additional layers by which life can respond to environmental queues.