RNA reflections: converging on Hfq

As the journal RNA celebrates its 20th anniversary, the role of non-coding RNAs as regulators is firmly established in a broad range of organisms. Among these are the many bacterial RNAs that pair with their targets and regulate mRNA stability and translation. In Escherichia coli and other gram-negative organisms, these small RNAs (sRNAs) depend on Hfq, a protein that chaperones pairing. Twenty years ago, Hfq was resuscitated after 15 years of obscurity and the extent and roles of bacterial regulatory RNAs were about to become appreciated to go well beyond the few examples in the literature.