Human telomerase mRNA (TERT mRNA)

The human telomerase mRNA (TERT mRNA) is a synthetic messenger RNA that expresses the human telomerase reverse transcriptase (TERT) in transfected cells. The synthetic human telomerase mRNA has a cap-1 structure and a long 3′-poly(A) tail. It also has a 100% substitution of the modified nucleotide N1-Methylpseudouridine (m1Ψ), which enhances the translation and reduces the innate antiviral response to single-stranded mRNA.

Telomerase reverse transcriptase is a catalytic subunit of the enzyme telomerase, which makes up the most important unit of the telomerase complex. The enzyme belongs to a distinct subgroup of RNA-dependent polymerases. Telomerase lengthens telomeres in DNA strands, allowing senescent cells to become potentially immortal. This is often the case for cancerous cells. TERT can catalyze the addition of the specific TTAGGG nucleotide sequence to the ends of telomeres, which prevents degradation of the chromosomal ends following multiple rounds of replication. The increased activity of hTERT is frequently observed in cells, including embryonic, adult stem, and cancer cells, that undergo rapid division. Since normal somatic cells do not express TERT, telomerase inhibition in cancer cells can cause senescence and apoptosis without affecting normal human cells. Moreover, the efficiency of the hTERT-mediated pluripotent stem (iPS) cell reprogramming is twenty times better than the efficiency given by mortal cell reprogramming.

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