Data associated with the publication: Small RNAs and Hfq capture unfolded RNA target sites during transcription

Small ribonucleoproteins (sRNPs) guide RNA folding, modification, splicing, and processing during transcription. The data associated with this manuscript examine how bacterial Hfq•DsrA sRNA complexes bind to actively elongating rpoS mRNA using single-molecule co-localization co-transcriptional assembly (smCoCoA). The results show that recruitment of Hfq upstream enabled dynamic sampling of rpoS transcripts for segments complementary to DsrA sRNA. Site-specific fluorophores on the DNA template reveal that Hfq•DsrA can target rpoS mRNA soon after the DsrA binding site is transcribed. The results suggest that sRNPs are able to capture a prospective target site before it is masked by folding of the nascent transcript, providing a kinetic advantage to co-transcripitonal targeting over post-transcriptional targeting. This dataset comprises metadata, EMCCD movies of smCoCoA experiments, and analyzed data used to create the figures in this manuscript.