Piwi
Genes and regulatory proteins / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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Piwi (or PIWI) genes were identified as regulatory proteins responsible for stem cell and germ cell differentiation.[4] Piwi is an abbreviation of P-element Induced WImpy testis[lower-alpha 1] in Drosophila.[6] Piwi proteins are highly conserved RNA-binding proteins and are present in both plants and animals.[7] Piwi proteins belong to the Argonaute/Piwi family and have been classified as nuclear proteins. Studies on Drosophila have also indicated that Piwi proteins have no slicer activity conferred by the presence of the Piwi domain.[8] In addition, Piwi associates with heterochromatin protein 1, an epigenetic modifier, and piRNA-complementary sequences. These are indications of the role Piwi plays in epigenetic regulation. Piwi proteins are also thought to control the biogenesis of piRNA as many Piwi-like proteins contain slicer activity which would allow Piwi proteins to process precursor piRNA into mature piRNA.
Piwi domain | |||||||||||
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Identifiers | |||||||||||
Symbol | Piwi | ||||||||||
Pfam | PF02171 | ||||||||||
InterPro | IPR003165 | ||||||||||
PROSITE | PS50822 | ||||||||||
CDD | cd02826 | ||||||||||
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