Distinct roles for S. cerevisiae H2A copies in recombination and repeat stability, with a role for H2A.1 threonine 126
- Tufts University, United States
- University of Alaska, Anchorage, United States
Abstract
CAG/CTG trinuncleotide repeats are fragile sequences that when expanded form DNA secondary structures and cause human disease. We evaluated CAG/CTG repeat stability and repair outcomes in histone H2 mutants in S. cerevisiae. Although the two copies of H2A are nearly identical in amino acid sequence, CAG repeat stability depends on H2A copy 1 (H2A.1) but not copy 2 (H2A.2). H2A.1 promotes high-fidelity homologous recombination, sister chromatid recombination (SCR), and break-induced replication whereas H2A.2 does not share these functions. Both decreased SCR and the increase in CAG expansions were due to the unique Thr126 residue in H2A.1 and hta1Δ or hta1-T126A mutants were epistatic to deletion of the Polδ subunit Pol32, suggesting a role for H2A.1 in D-loop extension. We conclude that H2A.1 plays a greater repair-specific role compared to H2A.2 and may be a first step towards evolution of a repair-specific function for H2AX compared to H2A in mammalian cells.
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All data generated or analyzed during this study are included in the manuscript and supporting files.
Article and author information
Author details
Catherine H Freudenreich
Funding
National Institutes of Health (P01GM105473)
- Catherine H Freudenreich
American Cancer Society (PF-18-125-10-DMC)
- Erica J Polleys
The funders had no role in study design, data collection and interpretation, or the decision to submit the work for publication.
Copyright
© 2019, House et al.
This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License permitting unrestricted use and redistribution provided that the original author and source are credited.
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Distinct roles for S. cerevisiae H2A copies in recombination and repeat stability, with a role for H2A.1 threonine 126
eLife 8:e53362.
https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.53362
