The Lighter Side

Poem: The Students Guide to a Perfect

Transcript

Indira Rajagopal*

From the Department of Biochemistry and Biophysics, Oregon State University,

Corvallis, Oregon 97331
Copyright 2013 by The International Union of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, 41(1):62, 2013

Pol IIs so smart, now let me see

It make a transcript, one, two, three,
From a billion base pairs can it find
The one promoter it must bind?

The last one is a special case

It moonlights as a helicase
And sends Pol II upon its way
To make a brand new RNA.

I need some help, I hear it plead,

This DNA I cannot read
I cannot see where I must start
Til TFIIs have done their part.

How does it do that, you may ask

A phosphate does the crucial task
Added on to CTD,
Thats how the H sets Pol II free.

When TATAs bound by TBP

That sends a signal out, you see
Once DNA has made a bend
More TFIIs will soon attend.

And Pol II goes its merry way

There soon will be some RNA
Then introns must be all excised
As RNA is capped and spliced.

When B arrives, it clears a place

For RNA polymerase
And F and E soon join the fun
TFIIHs the final one.

Then PolyA polymerase

Will add a couple hundred As
For my own transcript, I can say
That all I want is one more A.

C 2012 Indira Rajagopal.

Copyright V
*Address for correspondence to: Tel.: 541-737-4014; Fax: 541-737-0481.
E-mail: rajagopi@onid.orst.edu.

Received 24 July 2012

DOI: 10.1002/bmb.20654
Published online in Wiley Online Library
(wileyonlinelibrary.com)

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Biochemistry and Molecular Biology Education