Non-coding RNA and Inflammation

Dear Colleagues,

Inflammation is part of the process by which the immune system defends the body from invading pathogens. Even though acute inflammation is vital, chronic inflammation increases the risk of various diseases, from cancer to autoimmune disorders. The mechanisms triggering chronic inflammation are still largely unknown, especially in the context of autoimmune diseases.

Non-coding RNA (ncRNAs) are emerging as essential regulators of inflammation and immunity.     According to their length, they are classified as short ncRNAs (less than 200 nucleotides) and long ncRNAs (lncRNA). The former includes microRNAs (miRNAs) and small interfering RNA (siRNAs), both involved in gene expression silencing, Piwi-associated RNAs (piRNAs) known for their role in post-translation regulation, transfer RNA (tRNA) and tRNA-derived fragments (tRFs). tRNAs are among the most adbondant ncRNAs expressed in the cells, with newly discovered roles besides their canonical functions in protein translation, including the generation of specific tRFs able to modulate a large variety of cellular processes.

On the other hand, lncRNAs are a heterogeneous class of transcripts of more than 200 nucleotides with high tissue- and developmental stage-specificity, which play an important role in fine-tuning specialized cellular functions. Circular RNAs (circRNAs) are also included as a sub-class of lncRNA. They can act as miRNA sponges, or similarly to lncRNAs, they can be translated in exotic protein isoforms. The tissue specificity of the lncRNAs makes them attractive candidates for promising therapeutic strategies.

Since ncRNAs are secreted in the blood through extracellular vesicles (EVs) and some of them are particularly stable due to their structure (circRNAs) or the ability of dimerizing (tRFs), they represent potential biomarkers for disease onset/progression monitoring.

A robust amount of data produced in the last decade demonstrates that ncRNAs have primary roles in the activation of the immune cells (i.e., miRNAs and tRFs in T-cell activation) and remarkably interfere in the mechanism of action of chemokines and cytokines. However, the molecular mechanisms of ncRNA-mediated regulation of immune cell activation or change from acute to chronic inflammation are still largely unknown.

This Special Issue will be focussed on mechanistic studies elucidating the role of a particular class of ncRNAs in inflammation, how these molecules act at the cellular level, and how their expression is regulated. Research aimed to identify biomarkers able to monitor the progression of autoimmune diseases will also be considered since they are essential to better understand the evolution of the disease and monitor the effect of different therapeutic strategies. This could be extremely relevant for the detection and monitoring of autoimmune diseases such as type 1 diabetes, wherein the chronic inflammation is silent for years, and the onset of the disease occurs when the immune cells have already killed all the insulin-producing cells. In particular, in this Special Issue we would like to address:

1. The role of ncRNAs in the development of autoimmune diseases;
2. Novel functions of tRNAs and tRFs in immunity;
3. Small and long ncRNAs in inflammation initiation and progression;
4. CircRNAs in immune responses;
5. LncRNAs as emerging therapeutics;
6. Potential role of ncRNAs as biomarkers of inflammation;
7. Role of ncRNAs in immune cell cross-talk. Up-to-date review articles and experimental papers are welcome.

Dr. Flora Brozzi
Prof. Dr. Romano Regazzi
Prof. Dr. Mariana Igoillo-Esteve
Guest Editors

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• immune response
• Inflammation
• ncRNAs
• autoimmune diseases
• biomarkers
• circRNA
• lncRNA
• tRNA
• tRFs
• miRNA
• piRNA
• extracellular vesicles
• therapeutic targets