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Updated: Sep 28, 2026
Examination of Mitotic and Meiotic Fission Yeast Nuclear Dynamics by Fluorescence Live-cell Microscopy
Published on: June 24, 2019
Dicer is required for chromosome segregation and gene silencing in fission yeast cells
Patrick Provost1, Rebecca A Silverstein, David Dishart
1Department of Medical Biochemistry and Biophysics, Division of Physiological Chemistry II, Karolinska Institute, S-171 77 Stockholm, Sweden Europe.
Abstract:
RNA interference is a form of gene silencing in which the nuclease Dicer cleaves double-stranded RNA into small interfering RNAs. Here we report a role for Dicer in chromosome segregation of fission yeast. Deletion of the Dicer (dcr1+) gene caused slow growth, sensitivity to thiabendazole, lagging chromosomes during anaphase, and abrogated silencing of centromeric repeats. As Dicer in other species, Dcr1p degraded double-stranded RNA into approximately 23 nucleotide fragments in vitro, and dcr1Delta cells were partially rescued by expression of human Dicer, indicating evolutionarily conserved functions. Expression profiling demonstrated that dcr1+ was required for silencing of two genes containing a conserved motif.
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