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Description

RNA interference (RNAi) is mechanism for post-transcriptional gene silencing that leads to the loss of the activity of the gene. RNAi is activated when long dsRNAs are cleaved by the enzyme Dicer1 (RNase III family of dsRNA-specific endonucleases) into 21-23 nucleotide siRNA (small interfering RNA). These siRNAs bind proteins to form the RISC (RNA-induced silencing complex) which is activated when the double stranded siRNAs are unzipped to single stranded siRNAs. Activated RISC recognizes and binds complementary sequences in mRNA. The mRNA is cleaved and the overall effect is an inhibition of the protein expression and a loss of the gene activity. Dicer1 along with the Argonaute family of proteins (Ago1 and Ago2) share the same domain PIWI and PAZ domain that provide endonuclease activity to RNA-induced silencing complexes (RISC).