Barnes - MMR, DNA helicases, NHEJ, VDJ Flashcards
In summary what happens in MMR?
- recognition and repair of single bp mismatches and small insertions/dels
- monitors rep
- monitors recomb between homeologous
- v important for genome integrity
What do inherited mutations in MMR lead to?
- HNPCC (Hereditary Nonpolyposis Colorectal Cancer)
What are homeologous seqs?
- seqs that are not quite homologous, but nearly
What types of mismatches are recognised by MMR?
- non watson crick bps
- short insertion/del loops of typically 1-3nt (could be a few more)
What can’t MMR recognise, and what does?
- bulky structures –> adducts etc.
- worked on by other systems (nucleotide excision repair)
What are non Watson Crick bps, and what is the result of them?
- simply incorrect addition of bases
- half cells will have mistake conserved
When do short insertion/del loops typically occur?
- if have microsatellite and pol slips when passing through, then when starts rep again might not start in exactly the right place (wrong repeat)
- if starts too early get extra microsatellite
- or too late and get less copies of microsatellite in daughter cell
What % of colorectal cancers are due to inherited mutations, and MMR mutations?
- 30% due to inherited mutation
- and 10% of those due to MMR mutations (2-4% of all colorectal cancer cases)
What are MMR deficient cells esp prone to?
- microsatellite instability –> hallmark of this type of cancer
- so increased risk of acquiring mutations that transform cells to be cancerous
Is MMR proofreading, why?
- no, only recognising mismatches that have escaped proofreading by pols
What happens when pol recognises a mismatch?
- stall, sometimes fall off and other enzs come and remove mismatched strand
Do pols have proofreading activity, if so how?
- Most have intrinsic proofreading activity –> exonuclease activity to rewind back and synthesise the DNA region again
Does pol proofreading and MMR work well in WT cell?
- work together v well
- estimate only 1 error every 250 gens in S. cerevisiae
Is it ideal to have no mistakes made by pols/MMR?
- don’t want no mistakes, as need some for evo to act on for selection
What is the E. coli paradigm of MMR?
- rep error causes mismatch
- MutS recognises mismatch
- MutS attracts MutL and MutH
- MutH nicks newly synthesised strand
- exonucleolytic degrad passed the mismatch
- resynthesis
What would happen w/o MutS?
- get more digested DNA, as recognises mismatches for repair
What does undigested DNA look like on a gel?
- largest band at top of gel
What would happen if no MutS in DNA w/o any mismatches?
- wouldn’t matter
Does MutS bind homoduplex or heteroduplex DNA?
- binds mismatches (heteroduplex), but doesn’t bind at all to perfectly matched DNA (homoduplex)
What is the structure of MutS?
- homodimer = ring around DNA
- mismatch recognition dom –> creates kink at mismatched site in the DNA (only 1 subunit actually binds mismatch = asymmetry)
- ATPase dom –> binds ATP once mismatch identified (important for next stages of MMR
What does MutS recognise, and how?
- heteroduplex DNA
- mismatches sensed due to changes in thermal stability (ie. interactions between mismatches bps are weaker)
- diff efficiency for recognising diff types of mismatch
- mechanism:
- -> MutS binds nonspecifically to DNA
- -> creates bend in DNA duplex to test thermal stability
What is hemimethylation?
- half DNA meth
Why do E. coli have hemimeth?
- tell MMR which strand to repair
How do E. coli use hemimeth to aid MMR?
- DNA of some bacteria methylated at GATC sites by Dam methylase –> adds methyl group to A of GATC
- Dam methylase about 2 mins behind rep fork (lag), so for a while DNA hemimeth
- therefore in mismatched DNA, it is the newly unmeth strand that needs to be nicked and removed
- GATC sites fairly rare so MMR machinery needs to diffuse away from mismatch in order to find one and work out which strand to repair
How does MutS change conform after mismatch recognition, and why does it change?
- “sliding clamp”
- forms ring around DNA and can move along
- 600x more stable on DNA than when MutS searching for mismatches
How does MutS find GATC sites=?
- has to go maybe few 100 bp to find GATC site
How is ATP involved in MutS function?
- MutS has ATPase dom
- ATP hydrolysis needed for testing for mismatches, but is suppressed after mismatch recognition
ATP bound stably in sliding clamp mode
What is the role of MutL?
- the “matchmaker”
- contacts w/ mismatch bound MutS
What is the structure of MutL?
- also forms homodimer ring around DNA
What does MutL interact w/, and what is the purpose of these interactions?
- MutH endonuclease, which nicks DNA
- UvrD helicase, which unwinds DNA from the nick
- exonucleases to remove the newly synthesised strand
What is the role of MutH endonuclease
- cleaves unmeth stand at hemimeth GATC site
What does MutH endonuclease req to carry out cleavage?
- metal binding (Mg2+)
- hemimeth GATC recognition
- interaction w/ MutL
What type of DNA does MutH cleave?
- only hemimeth
- unmeth and fully meth isn’t
What controversy is there around MutS, but what is known?
- how diffusion away from mismatch and complex formation w/ other prots happens
- but importantly there is a loading of a no. of these complexes onto the mismatched DNA
How might MutS interact w/ the 3 central MMR prots?
- MutS recognises a mismatch
- then recruits MutL, then MutH, the whole complex moves together
- MutL and MutH can detach and move more quickly in search of hemimeth sites (= yoyo model)
What are the ds steps of MutS?
- UvrD helicase unwinds DNA back towards mismatch
- exonucleases: at least 4 diff ones –> both 5’-3’ and 3’-5’, so doesn’t matter which side nick is on
- DNA pol synthesises strand again
What pols carry out leading and lagging strand rep in euk MMR?
- leading strand rep by Polε
- lagging strand rep by Polα and Polδ
Is there a euk MutH homolog?
- no, but variety of mechs have been proposed and prob work together to ensure strand discrimination
What are the effects of msh2/3/6 mutations on MMR?
- msh2 mutants have bigger defect in MMR
- msh3 and 6 have defect but nowhere near as big
What is the effect of having double/triple mutations to msh2/3/6?
- if mutate msh3 and msh6 together then nearly as bad as msh2
- but if mutate msh2 w anything else then doesn’t make it any worse
What can be concluded about the epistatic relationship between the 3 MutS homologs?
- most important prot is msh2
- then mhs3 and 6, prob act in parallel pathway
In a gel shift experiment what are the diff bands?
- if prot binds, then moves slowly and get a band
- if bands all the way across, then just 2° structure from substrate and not relevant
In a gel shift experiment where is the naked DNA?
- at the bottom
Can msh2/3/6 bind DNA on their own?
- no
Can msh2/3/6 or any combos between them bind to homoduplex DNA?
- no
What is the euk homolog of MutS?
- msh prots
What does the fact that msh prots are heterodimers reflect?
- that bacterial homolog is an asymmetric homodimer
How does msh2 contact the mismatch?
- binds ATP
- pairs with Msh3 or Msh6, which contact the mismatch
Which combos of msh prots bind to larger and smaller IDLs?
- Msh2 + Msh3 (= MutSβ) bind to larger IDLs
- Msh2 + Msh6 (= MutSα) bind to bp-bp mismatches and 1 bp IDLs
What is the role of msh4 and msh5?
- meiosis specific homologs
What diff MLH prots are there?
- MutL homologs
- PMS (post meiotic seg) prots
What is MutLα in humans and yeast?
- humans = MLH1-PMS2 dimer
- yeast = MLH1-PMS1 dimer
What is the role of MutLα?
- mostly involved in post replicative MMR
- also is an endonuclease
What is MLH1-MLH3 heterodimer mostly used for?
- reg of meiotic recomb
What additional role do many euk MutL homologs have, to matchmakers?
- also have endonuclease activity
What is the role of MutL homologs?
- take the role of E. coli MutH –> endonucleolytic cleavage of one strand in heteroduplex DNA
- no seq specificity
What type of enz is exo1?
- 5’-3’ exonuclease
What is the role of exo1?
- req for reconstituted eukaryotic MMR in vitro
- has been shown to interact with MutS and MutL homologues
Why is exo1 not req in vivo?
- prob redundant systems that can take over if its absent
What is the probable mech of exo1 for strand discriminate?
- exo1 is loaded readily at the nicks in-between Okazaki fragments (lagging strand only)
What is PCNA?
- proliferating cell nuclear antigen
- processivity factor for DNA polymerase
What are the roles of PCNA?
- enhances MutLα endonuclease activity (not essential)
- interacts with exo1
How can interaction w/ PCNA result in strand discrimination in euk MMR?
- due to asymmetrical loading of PCNA onto nascent DNA
Do exo1 indep pathways exist?
- yes
- exo1 can remove the mismatched strand
- but not essential for MMR in vivo (mild mutator phenotype)
- so there is 2nd, Exo1-indep, pathway of eukaryotic MMR –> not clear what alt exonuclease is
What is the 2nd main job of MMR?
- monitoring HR
What is conjugation, and what can it measure?
- integration by recomb of DNA from 1 bacteria species into another
- way of measuring recomb between homeologous species
What were the findings of an experiment that looked at interspecies recomb and measured conjugation?
- looked at recomb between Hfr DNA from S. typhimurium and circular chrom of E. coli
- 735x more recomb in absence of MutS prot
- so MMR somehow blocking recomb between these divergent seqs
How does strand invasion result in heteroduplex, and what happens next?
- once occurred, then have mismatches in this region
What is the action of MMR machinery on heteroduplex DNA?
- acts to recognise heteroduplex DNA and process it
What is the general trend in recombination efficiency as sequence divergence increases?
- recomb decreases = loglinear relationship
What is the general effect of removing the MMR pathway (msh2 KO)?
- amount of recomb increases
What is the effect of very low levels of divergence on recomb efficiency?
- if perfectly matched (0% divergence) then exactly the same for MMR KO and WT cells
- but if look at even v low amounts of mismatches then see sharp reduction in WT cells comp to MMR mutants (single mismatch enough to reduce recomb efficiency in MMR+ cells)
What is the effect of mismatches, and the MMR system, on homologous recombination?
- mismatches reduce efficiency of MMR
- mismatches reduce amount of recomb
- MMR limits recomb between homeologous DNA molecules
What is the purpose of MutS homologs used experimentally to recognise mismatches?
- to trap mismatches intermeds to mark them as a problem and stop them being resolved
What is heteroduplex rejection, and how does it occur?
- unwinding of mismatched DNA by helicases, not necessarily part of machinery for post replicative MMR = “anti-recombination”
- MutS homologs attract 3’-5’ helicases
How does heteroduplex rejection differ in E. coli and S. cerevisiae?
- in E. coli = UvrD (so is the same)
- in S. cerevisiae = inc Sgs1 and Srs2 (not involved in post replicative MMR but are important in other repair pathways
Where does MMR act in HR?
- at diff stages
What are MMR homologs important for in meiosis?
- promoting CO outcomes
What are msh4 and msh5 homologous to, and how do they differ to this?
- meiosis specific MutS homologs
- not involved in post replicative MMR or in mitotic HR
- homologous w/ other MutS homologs, but lacking mismatch recognition dom
What is the role of msh4-msh5 dimer?
- recognise and stab of strand invasion intermeds
What is the mlh1-mlh3 dimer, and what is its role?
- MutL heterodimer specialising in dHJ resolution
- endonuclease activity
- promotes CO, rather than non CO outcomes
What are DNA repair helicases involved in?
- many aspects of DNA repair, recomb and rep
What are the roles of some RecQ helicases?
- lots of interlinked roles, inc:
- -> BLM: promotes non CO outcomes in HR
- -> WRN: removes structures at telomeres so they can be rep
What are helicases, what do they function in?
- class of enzs that cat sep of duplex NA into single strand in ATP dep reaction
- function in DNA mod processing, inc DNA rep, DNA repair, recomb, transcrip, translation and many other NA related processes
How do helicases perform their role?
- through disruption of H bonds between DNA and/or RNA strands
- translocate along ssDNA, fuelled by hydrolysis of ATP
What does direction of helicases mean?
- describes direction of the translocation, NOT strand being displaced from the duplex
- DIAG
How do the 6 helicase superfam differ?
- some, eg. RecQ and Fe-S helicases are monomeric and contain tandem repeat of RecA like motor core
- some, eg. those involved in rep, are hexameric
How many RecQ members are there in humans?
- 5 members