PAR-CLIP is a novel method, used for identifying the binding sites of cellular RNA-binding proteins (RBPs) and microRNA-containing ribonucleoprotein complexes (miRNPs). The method relies on the incorporation of photoreactive ribonucleoside analogs, such as 4-thiouridine (4-SU) and 6-thioguanosine (6-SG) into nascent RNA transcripts by living cells. Irradiation of the cells by UV light of 365 nm induces efficient crosslinking of photoreactive nucleoside-labeled cellular RNAs to interacting RBPs. Immunoprecipitation of the RBP of interest is followed by isolation of the crosslinked and coimmunoprecipitated RNA. The isolated RNA is converted into a cDNA library and deep sequenced using next-generation sequencing technology.

Recently, PAR-CLIP have been applied to determine the transcriptome-wide binding sites of several known RBPs and microRNA-containing ribonucleoprotein complexes at high resolution.

External links

• starBase database: a database for exploring protein-RNA and miRNA-target interactions from PAR-CLIP(CLIP-Seq
  CLIP-Seq
  CLIP-Seq, also called HITS-CLIP, is a method in molecular biology, used for finding which RNA species interact with a particular RNA-binding protein...
  
  , HITS-CLIP
  HITS-CLIP
  High-throughput sequencing of RNA isolated by crosslinking immunoprecipitation is a genome-wide means of mapping protein–RNA binding sites in vivo...
  
  ) data.