FEBS Letters
Volume 580, Issue 10 , Pages 2442-2450, 1 May 2006

The evolution and diversification of Dicers in plants

Edited by Shou-Wei Ding

  • Rogerio Margis

      Affiliations

    • CSIRO Plant Industry, P.O. Box 1600, Canberra, ACT 2601, Australia
    • Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul, UFRGS, Porto Alegre, Brazil
    • ,
  • Adriana F. Fusaro

      Affiliations

    • CSIRO Plant Industry, P.O. Box 1600, Canberra, ACT 2601, Australia
    • ,
  • Neil A. Smith

      Affiliations

    • CSIRO Plant Industry, P.O. Box 1600, Canberra, ACT 2601, Australia
    • ,
  • Shaun J. Curtin

      Affiliations

    • CSIRO Plant Industry, P.O. Box 1600, Canberra, ACT 2601, Australia
    • ,
  • John M. Watson

      Affiliations

    • CSIRO Plant Industry, P.O. Box 1600, Canberra, ACT 2601, Australia
    • ,
  • E. Jean Finnegan

      Affiliations

    • CSIRO Plant Industry, P.O. Box 1600, Canberra, ACT 2601, Australia
    • ,
  • Peter M. Waterhouse

      Affiliations

    • CSIRO Plant Industry, P.O. Box 1600, Canberra, ACT 2601, Australia
    • Corresponding Author InformationCorresponding author. Fax: +61 2 62465000.

Received 2 February 2006; received in revised form 24 March 2006; accepted 28 March 2006. published online 07 April 2006.

Abstract 

Most multicellular organisms regulate developmental transitions by microRNAs, which are generated by an enzyme, Dicer. Insects and fungi have two Dicer-like genes, and many animals have only one, yet the plant, Arabidopsis, has four. Examining the poplar and rice genomes revealed that they contain five and six Dicer-like genes, respectively. Analysis of these genes suggests that plants require a basic set of four Dicer types which were present before the divergence of mono- and dicotyledonous plants (∼200 million years ago), but after the divergence of plants from green algae. A fifth type of Dicer seems to have evolved in monocots.

Keywords: Dicer, RNAi, Evolution

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PII: S0014-5793(06)00402-9

doi:10.1016/j.febslet.2006.03.072

FEBS Letters
Volume 580, Issue 10 , Pages 2442-2450, 1 May 2006

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