Structure of the human Dicer-TRBP complex by electron microscopy

Structure of the human Dicer-TRBP complex by electron microscopy

Dicer is a specialized ribonuclease that initiates RNA interference (RNAi) by cleaving double-stranded RNA (dsRNA) into small RNA fragments about 22 nucleotides long. Here, we present the three-dimensional structure of human Dicer bound to the protein TRBP at approximately 20 A resolution determined by negative-stain electron microscopy (EM) and single-particle analysis. This result offers insights into the structure of Dicer proteins found in multicellular organisms and provides a conceptual framework for understanding the initiation of RNAi.

Pick-Wei Lau, Clinton S. Potter, Bridget Carragher, Ian J. MacRae – National Resource for Automated Molecular Microscopy, The Scripps Institute, La Jolla, CA 92037, USA.