Background
Cytoplasmic polyadenylation element-binding proteins are a family of sequence-specific RNA-binding proteins that bind to the CPE, a uridine-rich sequence element within the mRNA 3’ UTR, to regulate mRNA translation. The CPEB family consists of four members in vertebrates: CPEB1, CPEB2, CPEB3, and CPEB4. All four paralogs share sequence similarities in their carboxy-terminal RNA-binding domains, but vary in the sequence of their amino-terminal regulatory domains. CPEB4 has specifically been linked to autism spectrum disorder, where it has been found to bind to the mRNA transcripts of most high-confidence ASD risk genes. Moreover, young idiopathic ASD individuals show decreased CPEB4 protein levels in the brain, and consequently decreased protein levels of multiple ASD risk gene transcripts compared to controls. CPEB4 is also abnormally expressed in a large number of cancers and often correlates with poor prognosis, including glioblastoma/glioma, head and neck squamous cell carcinoma, non-small cell lung cancer, colon cancer, and breast cancer, among others.
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