Argonaute
The Argonaute protein family, first discovered for its evolutionarily conserved stem cell function, plays a central role in RNA silencing processes as essential components of the RNA-induced silencing complex (RISC). RISC is responsible for the gene silencing phenomenon known as RNA interference (RNAi). Argonaute proteins bind different classes of small non-coding RNAs, including microRNAs (miRNAs), small interfering RNAs (siRNAs) and Piwi-interacting RNAs (piRNAs). Small RNAs guide Argonaute proteins to their specific targets through sequence complementarity (base pairing), which then leads to mRNA cleavage, translation inhibition, and/or the initiation of mRNA decay.
The name of this protein family is derived from a mutant phenotype resulting from mutation of AGO1 in Arabidopsis thaliana, which was likened by Bohmert et al. to the appearance of the pelagic octopus Argonauta argo.
| Argonaute Piwi domain | |||||||||
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An argonaute protein from Pyrococcus furiosus. PDB 1U04. PIWI domain is on the right, PAZ domain to the left. | |||||||||
| Identifiers | |||||||||
| Symbol | Piwi | ||||||||
| Pfam | PF02171 | ||||||||
| InterPro | IPR003165 | ||||||||
| PROSITE | PS50822 | ||||||||
| CDD | cd02826 | ||||||||
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| Argonaute Paz domain | |||||||||
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| Identifiers | |||||||||
| Symbol | Paz | ||||||||
| Pfam | PF12212 | ||||||||
| InterPro | IPR021103 | ||||||||
| SCOP2 | b.34.14.1 / SCOPe / SUPFAM | ||||||||
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