Assess graduate-level understanding of eukaryotic microRNA (miRNA) mechanisms of post-transcriptional gene regulation, covering miRNA biogenesis and RISC assembly, principles of target recognition (seed pairing and non-canonical interactions), molecular outcomes (translational repression, deadenylation, decapping, and mRNA decay), context-dependent modulation, and common experimental approaches for target identification and validation; include conceptual explanations, interpretation of experimental data, and design of validation experiments.