Transcriptomes are the sum total of all the messenger RNA molecules expressed from the genome. Transcript/ gene isoforms are mRNAs that are produced from the same stretch of DNA but differ in stability and translational efficiency and potentially function since they have different transcription start sites, protein-coding DNA sequence, or UTRs. This paper goes into analysis of the drosophila transcriptome and proves that the drosophila genome is much more complex than previously imagined. This complexity arises from three sources: promoter, splice sites, polyadenylation sites.
Figure 4 looks into tissue- and sex-specific splicing in drosophila. Transcript diversity: over half of spliced genes encode two or more transcript isoforms. The researchers measured splicing efficiency through "per cent spliced in"- the fraction of isoforms that contain the particular exon. To examine the dynamics of splicing, switch scores are calculated for each splicing event, and examined tissue and sex-specific. Results show that most splicing events are highly tissue specific. Results also show that majority of the sex-specific splicing is due to tissue-specific splicing of tissues present specifically in either male flies (testes) or female flies (ovaries).
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