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Review
. 2017 May 4;474(10):1603-1618.
doi: 10.1042/BCJ20160759.

Molecular mechanisms of Dicer: endonuclease and enzymatic activity

Min-Sun Song  1 , John J Rossi  1   2
Affiliations
Review

Molecular mechanisms of Dicer: endonuclease and enzymatic activity

Min-Sun Song et al. Biochem J. .

Abstract

The enzyme Dicer is best known for its role as a riboendonuclease in the small RNA pathway. In this canonical role, Dicer is a critical regulator of the biogenesis of microRNA and small interfering RNA, as well as a growing number of additional small RNAs derived from various sources. Emerging evidence demonstrates that Dicer's endonuclease role extends beyond the generation of small RNAs; it is also involved in processing additional endogenous and exogenous substrates, and is becoming increasingly implicated in regulating a variety of other cellular processes, outside of its endonuclease function. This review will describe the canonical and newly identified functions of Dicer.

Keywords: endoribonuclease Dicer; microRNA; small interfering RNA; viral small RNA.

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Conflict of interest statement

The Authors declare that there are no competing interests associated with the manuscript.

Figures

Figure 1.
Figure 1.. Dicer structure and functions.
(A) The structure of Dicer. The number one indicates the amino-terminal. The amino-terminal helicase domain forms a clamp-like structure in the base of the L shape and is thought to reorganize and wrap around dsRNA. DExD/H, DExD/H box helicase domain; TRBP-BD, trans-activation response RNA-binding protein-binding domain; HELICc, helicase conserved carboxy-terminal domain; DUF283, domain of unknown function; PAZ, Piwi/Argonaute/Zwille domain; two RNase III domains; RBD, dsRNA-binding domain. (B) Multifaceted Dicer function. I. Active Dicer recognizes many types of RNA and can cleave small RNAs. II. Passive Dicer can be stably bound to RNA without endonuclease activity. Dicer does not efficiently process RNA if no free ends are available [33,177] which explains the resistance of the long non-coding RNA rncs-1 against dicing [178]. III. Dicer alone can function as a binding protein. For example, Ras/Erk signaling and Dicer regulate oogenesis, and Dicer was identified as a putative ERK substrate [166].
Figure 2.
Figure 2.. Phylogenetic tree of Dicer and domain analysis.
(A) Phylogenetic diversity of eukaryotic Dicer proteins. We inferred the Dicer family phylogeny using the maximum likelihood method. The number has been indicated in bootstrap value. (B) Complex Dicer protein domain composition. DCL, Dicer-like.
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