Anatomy of RISC: how do small RNAs and chaperones activate Argonaute proteins?

RNA silencing is a eukaryote‐specific phenomenon in which microRNAs and small interfering RNAs degrade messenger RNAs containing a complementary sequence. To this end, these small RNAs need to be loaded onto an Argonaute protein ( AGO protein) to form the effector complex referred to as RNA ‐induced silencing complex ( RISC ). RISC assembly undergoes multiple and sequential steps with the aid of Hsc70/Hsp90 chaperone machinery. The molecular...