Eukaryotic Recombination: Initiation by Double‐strand Breaks

Christine Richardson, Sloan‐Kettering Institute, New York, New York, USA
Maria Jasin, Sloan‐Kettering Institute, New York, New York, USA

Published online: April 2001

DOI: 10.1038/npg.els.0000577

A double-strand break in one deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) double helix, possibly caused by DNA damaging agents such as ionizing radiation or normal metabolic processes, stimulates repair by a pathway of recombination that uses a second unbroken DNA double helix containing homologous sequences as a donor of genetic information to restore the intact DNA structure.

Keywords: DNA repair; double-strand break; genome stability; recombination

Figure 1. Two models for double-strand break (DSB)-induced recombination. Following a double-strand break in one DNA helix, a processed end can invade a homologous template to initiate repair. This process may either proceed by a replication-based mechanism that results in gene conversion products, or by the classical double-strand repair model that can result in both crossover and noncrossover products, depending on resolution of the Holliday junction intermediate.
Figure 2. Model for mating-type switching in yeast. Following a double-strand break at one locus by the HO endonuclease, invasion of a single-strand tail from the broken MAT locus into the unbroken donor leads to a replication-based recombination event in which gene conversion leads to mating-type switching.
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 Further Reading
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    book Richardson C, Elliott B and Jasin M (1999) "Chromosomal double-strand breaks introduced in mammalian cells by expression of I-SceI endonuclease". In: Henderson D (ed.) DNA Repair Protocols: Eukaryotic Systems, pp. 453–464. Totowa, NJ: Humana Press.
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    book Subramani S and Seaton BL (1988) "Homologous recombination in mitotically dividing mammalian cells". In: Kucherlapati R and Smith GR (eds) Genetic Recombination, pp. 549–573. Washington, DC: American Society for Microbiology

Related Sub-Topics:

Replication and Recombination | DNA Structure and Function | DNA Damage and Repair | Nucleic Acids: Structure, Function, Metabolism
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Article Title: Eukaryotic Recombination: Initiation by Double‐strand Breaks
 
How to Cite close
Richardson, Christine, and Jasin, Maria(Apr 2001) Eukaryotic Recombination: Initiation by Double‐strand Breaks. In: eLS. John Wiley & Sons Ltd, Chichester. http://www.els.net [doi: 10.1038/npg.els.0000577]