We suspect a bi-directional transcription event is happening at a locus in our organism where two genes are directly adjacent to each other. The annotation data is not well established. The intergenic distance is probably less than 200 base pairs.

The two genes are expressed in opposite directions towards each other. Base on the preliminary transcriptomics data, it seems like one gene is over transcribing (3' UTR perhaps?) into the adjacent gene, possibly resulting in some kind of transcriptional regulation of the adjacent gene.

Here is a rough diagram of what we think might be happening:

-------==========gene A================>----------------------

----------------------------------------<====gene B=====-----------------------

Of course we need to first confirm this by designing primers to see if this over transcription is actually happening.

If this is happening, we intend to do some knock down experiments. We have no transgenesis available in our organism, only RNAi by dsRNA. It is possible to specifically knock down geneA by introducing dsRNA to the 5' region of geneA that does not overlap with geneB. Perhaps this will lead to ectopic/over expression of geneB.

Is there anyway to knock down geneB specifically without knocking down geneA? It looks like designing dsRNA for geneB would knock down both A and B.

We suspect a bi-directional transcription event is happening at a locus in our organism where two genes are directly adjacent to each other. The annotation data is not well established. The intergenic distance is probably less than 200 base pairs.

The two genes are expressed in opposite directions towards each other. Base on the preliminary transcriptomics data, it seems like one gene is over transcribing (3' UTR perhaps?) into the adjacent gene, possibly resulting in some kind of transcriptional regulation of the adjacent gene.

Here is a rough diagram of what we think might be happening:

------------------------==========gene A================>----------------------

----------------------------------------<====gene B=====-----------------------

Of course we need to first confirm this by designing primers to see if this over transcription is actually happening.

If this is happening, we intend to do some knock down experiments. We have no transgenesis available in our organism, only RNAi by dsRNA. It is possible to specifically knock down geneA by introducing dsRNA to the 5' region of geneA that does not overlap with geneB. Perhaps this will lead to ectopic/over expression of geneB.

Is there anyway to knock down geneB specifically without knocking down geneA? It looks like designing dsRNA for geneB would knock down both A and B.