Biogenesis and function of rice small RNAs from non-coding RNA precursors

► Rice has many microRNAs conserved with other plants as well as miRNA types not found in Arabidopsis. ► Rice microRNAs have diverse functions. ► Rice trans-acting siRNAs have important roles in plant development. ► The rice genome encodes numerous long, non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs) that are expressed during reproductive development. ► These reproductive lncRNAs give rise to phased 21-nt or 24-nt siRNAs, small RNAs with unknown functions.