Mir-16 microRNA precursor family

The miR-16 microRNA precursor family is a group of related small non-coding RNA genes that regulate gene expression. miR-16, miR-15, mir-195 and miR-457 are related microRNA precursor sequences (MIPF000006). This microRNA family appears to be vertebrate specific and members of this family have been predicted or experimentally validated in a wide range of vertebrate species (MIPF0000006). miR-16 and miR-15a are clustered within 0.5 kilobases at 13q14 in human, a chromosomal region shown to be deleted or down-regulated in more than half of B cell chronic lymphocytic leukaemias (CLL).