mRNAdesigner: an integrated web server for optimizing mRNA design and protein translation in eukaryotes
Ouyang Mo, Zhuo Zhang, Xiang Cheng, Liqi Zhu, Kaixiang Zhang, Niubing Zhang, Justin Li, Honglin Li, Fan Su, Xuan Li, Pei Hao
Abstract
Messenger RNA (mRNA) therapy has revolutionized modern medicine through its rapid development capabilities and ability to induce effective immune responses, becoming a powerful weapon against infectious diseases. The expression level of target proteins from mRNA sequences is primarily influenced by translational efficiency and stability, which can be significantly enhanced by modifying the 5' and 3' untranslated regions (UTRs), codon adaptation index, GC content, and secondary structure. To address the challenges of optimizing mRNA design, we have developed mRNAdesigner (https://www.biosino.org/mRNAdesigner/), a web server specifically designed to improve mRNA stability and translational efficiency in eukaryotes. Users can input a coding sequence (CDS) along with optional 5' UTR and 3' UTR, and the tool optimizes the CDS by reducing unpaired regions, minimizing complex stem-loop structures, and mitigating the use of rare codons while adhering to user-defined GC content preferences. Additionally, mRNAdesigner identifies optimal UTR sequences to enhance translation efficiency and stability. As an open-access computational resource, mRNAdesigner supports full-length mRNA design, enabling researchers to generate high-expression mRNA sequences for efficient protein production in eukaryotic expression systems, providing extra support for vaccine development and protein therapeutics. This is the first such tool that was made open accessible to the public.