Content may be subject to copyright.This is a pre-copyedited, author-produced PDF of an article accepted for publication in Briefings in Functional Genomics... ...This is a pre-copyedited, author-produced PDF of an article accepted for publication in Briefings in Functional Genomics following peer review. The version of record [From 'JUNK' to Just Unexplored Noncoding Knowledge: the case of transcribed Alus. Briefings in Functional Genomics 10, 6 p400-400 (2011)] is available online at: https://doi.org/10.1093/bfgp/elr044.