This release contains only the music track from Base by Base Episode 294.

Song title: The Splice of Life
Original Base by Base episode: 294: Alternative splicing, exonization and lineage-specific isoforms: PTBP1, MAPT and TE-derived exons in mammalian evolution
Original episode link: https://basebybase.com/episodes/alternative-splicing-exonization-evolution

Article metadata:
Article title: The splice of life: how alternative splicing shapes regulatory and phenotypic evolution
Journal: The EMBO Journal, doi:10.1038/s44318-025-00666-z
DOI: 10.1038/s44318-025-00666-z
Reference: Hunter CE, Xing Y. The splice of life: how alternative splicing shapes regulatory and phenotypic evolution. The EMBO Journal. 2026. https://doi.org/10.1038/s44318-025-00666-z

Lyrics:
Verse 1
Late labs and looping screens where letters shift and slide,
We cut and sew the code, revealing doors we used to hide,
Tiny exons pop like stars, new shapes that redefine,
Isoforms hum their different tunes along the spine.

Pre-Chorus
Across the tree of life the patterns cluster by their kind,
Some changes live in the sequence; some wander from mobile lines,
Alu's small notes can find a voice, a fragment redefined.

Chorus
We call it the splice of life, where choices make a song,
A decoy that calms the storm, a beat that mends a wrong,
A skipped exon tunes the heart, a tau ratio re-sings strong.

Verse 2
Long-read lights and single cells peel isoforms into view,
Mass spec finds the bodies where those coded fragments do come true,
Many edits keep the frame, some outcomes still unknown,
But each revealed possibility becomes a clue, a tone.

Bridge
Cis changes open doors; trans factors rewire the halls,
Old jumps from transposons become new scripts that call,
Evolution drafts in whispers, then the phenotype enthralls.

Final Chorus
This splice, a small conviction that rewrites how we feel,
From immune decoy to faster pulse, the hidden parts reveal,
We stitch the threads of life, and for a moment, it is real.