Tsn, Tudor-staphylococcal nuclease; Vig, vasa intronic gene. Binding of mRNA It is as yet unclear how the activated RISC complex locates the mRNA targets in the cell, though it has been shown that the process can occur in situations outside of ongoing protein translation from mRNA. Endogenously expressed miRNA in metazoans is usually not perfectly complementary to a large number of genes and thus, they modulate expression via translational repression. However, in plants, the process has a much greater specificity to target mRNA and usually each miRNA only binds to one mRNA. A greater specificity means mRNA degradation is more likely to occur. See also RNA-induced transcriptional silencing (RITS) RNA interference References Further reading External links RNA