DICER1 gene is located on chromosome 14q32.13 and plays a crucial role in the control of protein translation; its product, dicer protein, is a ribonuclease (RNase) III endoribonuclease which is essential for the production of microRNAs (miRNA) which are formed by the cleavage of pre-miRNA or double-stranded RNA1–4. RNase III contains two domains, IIIa and IIIb which cleave 3p miRNA and 5p miRNA from the 3′ and 5′ pre-miRNA, respectively. These cleavages require magnesium ions at the interface between the IIIa and IIIb domains and the miRNA; this magnesium dependent catalytic processing occurs at specific residues, E1320, E1564, E1813 and D17092–4. miRNA has a pivotal role in regulating the expression of over 30% of protein-coding genes by its interaction with mRNA5. Given the impact of DICER1 in post-translational events, it is not entirely surprising that functional DICER1 is essential for vertebrate development as evidenced by developmental arrest and death of the embryo when both alleles are lost6,7. Conceptually, DICER1 can be regarded as either a tumor suppressor gene due to loss-of-function mutations or an oncogene due to gain-of-function mutations; it is thought to function as a haploinsufficient tumor suppressor gene with the loss of one allele leading to tumor progression but loss of both alleles having an inhibitory effect for tumor development implying that one intact allele is needed for cell survival8.