Project description:The hydrolytic deamination of cytosine and 5-methylcytosine drives many of the transition mutations observed in human cancer. The deamination-induced mutagenic intermediates are either uracil or thymine adducts mispaired with guanine. While a substantial array of methods exists to measure other types of DNA adducts, the cytosine deamination adducts pose unusual analytical problems and adequate methods to measure them have not yet been developed. We describe here a novel hybrid thymine DNA glycosylase, hyTDG, which is comprised of a 29-amino acid sequence from human thymine DNA glycosylase linked to a thymine glycosylase found in an archaeal thermophilic bacterium. Using defined-sequence oligonucleotides, we show that hyTDG has robust mispair-selective activity against deaminated U:G and T:G mispairs. We have further developed a method for separating glycosylase-released free bases from oligonucleotides and DNA followed by GC-MS/MS identification and quantification. Using this approach, we have measured for the first time the levels of total Uracil (U), U:G and T:G in calf thymus DNA. The method presented here will allow the measurement of the formation, persistence, and repair of a biologically important class of deaminated cytosine adducts.
Project description:The nematode Caenorhabditis elegans has been used extensively to study responses to DNA damage. In contrast, little is known about DNA repair in this organism. C. elegans is unusual in that it encodes few DNA glycosylases and the uracil-DNA glycosylase (UDG) encoded by the ung-1 gene is the only known UDG. C. elegans could therefore become a valuable model organism for studies of the genetic interaction networks involving base excision repair (BER). As a first step towards characterization of BER in C. elegans, we show that the UNG-1 protein is an active uracil-DNA glycosylase. We demonstrate that an ung-1 mutant has reduced ability to repair uracil-containing DNA but that an alternative Ugi-inhibited activity is present in ung-1 nuclear extracts. Finally, we demonstrate that ung-1 mutants show altered levels of apoptotic cell corpses formed in response to DNA damaging agents. Increased apoptosis in the ung-1 mutant in response to ionizing radiation (IR) suggests that UNG-1 contributes to repair of IR-induced DNA base damage in vivo. Following treatment with paraquat however, the apoptotic corpse-formation was reduced. Gene expression profiling suggests that this phenotype is a consequence of compensatory transcriptomic shifts that modulate oxidative stress responses in the mutant and not an effect of reduced DNA damage signaling. C. elegans RNAi mutants deficient in ung-1 and the corresponding wild-type N2, were subjected to Affymetrix whole C. elegans genome microarrays. Triplicates were run for each sample group.
Project description:The nematode Caenorhabditis elegans has been used extensively to study responses to DNA damage. In contrast, little is known about DNA repair in this organism. C. elegans is unusual in that it encodes few DNA glycosylases and the uracil-DNA glycosylase (UDG) encoded by the ung-1 gene is the only known UDG. C. elegans could therefore become a valuable model organism for studies of the genetic interaction networks involving base excision repair (BER). As a first step towards characterization of BER in C. elegans, we show that the UNG-1 protein is an active uracil-DNA glycosylase. We demonstrate that an ung-1 mutant has reduced ability to repair uracil-containing DNA but that an alternative Ugi-inhibited activity is present in ung-1 nuclear extracts. Finally, we demonstrate that ung-1 mutants show altered levels of apoptotic cell corpses formed in response to DNA damaging agents. Increased apoptosis in the ung-1 mutant in response to ionizing radiation (IR) suggests that UNG-1 contributes to repair of IR-induced DNA base damage in vivo. Following treatment with paraquat however, the apoptotic corpse-formation was reduced. Gene expression profiling suggests that this phenotype is a consequence of compensatory transcriptomic shifts that modulate oxidative stress responses in the mutant and not an effect of reduced DNA damage signaling.
Project description:HDAC inhibitors (HDACi) belong to a new group of chemotherapeutics that are increasingly used to treat B-cell-derived malignancies. Such malignancies regularly carry mutational signatures that conform to off-target induction of uracil by the AID/APOBEC family of cytidine deaminases, or downstream processing of uracil. . HDACi suppress thymidylate synthase increasing the cellular dUTP/dTTP ratio and leading to increased pressure on uracil repair machinery due to misincorporated uracil lesions. To investigate potential effect upon other enzymes involved in genomic uracil induction and processing, Jurkat (T-cell lymphoma) and SUDHL5 (B-cell lymphoma) cells were treated with pan-HDACi SAHA prior to SILAC based MS/MS investigation. HDACi treatment mediated significant differential expression of xx and xx proteins in Jurkat and SUDHL5, respectively, and had a substantial impact upon enzymes involved in in pyrimidine metabolism. Surprisingly, uracil N-glycosylase, UNG, was strongly downregulated by HDACi treatment. Further analysis in HEK and HeLa cells revealed that HDACis induce specific loss of the nuclear isoform UNG2 independent of transcription and cell-cycle alterations. More than 80% of UNG2 is degraded proteasomally after 24 hours treatment with SAHA, MS275, Valproate or Na-butyrate, indicating a universal ability of HDACis to mediate loss of UNG2. Targeted MS/MS analysis in HEK cells against a panel of proteins involved in DNA repair, translesion synthesis and nucleotide metabolism, revealed that UNG2 was the most pronounced differentially expressed among these after HDACi treatment. 48 hour treatment lead to a 30-40% increase in uracil lesions in the nuclear genome of HeLa and HEK cells and MS275 treatment in murine CH12F3 cell line mediated robust UNG2-loss accompanied by reduced class switch recombination. Furthermore, our analysis identified the PCNA-associated factor PAF15 among the downregulated proteins. PAF15 is overexpressed in many cancers and suppress TLS by inducing double monoubiquitinylation of PCNA and recruitment of the replicative polymerases. In summary, our findings demonstrate that HDAC inhibition affects the levels of proteins involved in DNA base excision repair, translesion synthesis and pyrimidine metabolism. These findings are important for a wide range of clinical applications of HDACi, such as in rheumatology, HIV-, and cancer treatment.
Project description:Meiotic recombination facilitates accurate pairing and faithful segregation of homologous chromosomes by forming physical connections (crossovers) between homologs. Developmentally programmed DNA double-strand breaks (DSBs) generated by Spo11 protein (Rec12 in fission yeast) initiate meiotic recombination. Until recently, attempts to address the basis of the highly non-random distribution of DSBs on a genome-wide scale have been limited to 0.1–1 kb resolution of DSB position. We have assessed individual DSB events across the Schizosaccharomyces pombe genome at near-nucleotide resolution by deep-sequencing the short oligonucleotides connected to Rec12 following DNA cleavage. The single oligonucleotide size-class generated by Rec12 allowed us to effectively analyze all break events. Our high-resolution DSB map shows that the influence of underlying nucleotide sequence and chromosomal architecture differs in multiple ways from that in budding yeast. Rec12 action is not strongly restricted to nucleosome-depleted regions but is nevertheless spatially biased with respect to chromatin structure. Furthermore, we find strong evidence across the genome for differential DSB repair previously predicted to account for crossover invariance (constant cM/kb in spite of DSB hotspots). Our genome-wide analyses demonstrate evolutionarily fluid factors contributing to crossover initiation and its regulation.
Project description:Cytosine deamination to uracil in DNA leads to mutations if the DNA lesion is not corrected. Base excision repair (BER) initiated by single-strand selective uracil-DNA glycosylase 1 (SMUG1) primarily recognizes uracil and oxidized pyrimidines, and processes them to restore the correct bases. SMUG1 status has been associated with cancer risk and therapeutic response as high levels of SMUG1 were observed in breast carcinomas and other cancer types. The role of SMUG1 in breast cancer is not completely understood. Here, we define a bad prognosis signature for SMUG1 interactors in different cancers by mapping out a SMUG1 interaction network. Survival analyses of patient outcomes show that high expression of genes in the bad prognosis network correlates with lower survival probability in breast cancer. Interestingly, bioinformatics analyses suggested let-7b-5p microRNA as one of the upstream regulators of SMUG1 interactors. Expression of SMUG1 and let-7b-5p are negatively correlated in breast cancer and we observed an inhibitory auto-regulatory loop between SMUG1 and let-7b-5p in MCF-7 cells. Hence, SMUG1 is a key player connecting RNA and DNA metabolism with regulation of gene expression.
Project description:Base excision repair (BER) initiated by alkyladenine DNA glycosylase (AAG; aka MPG) is essential for removal of aberrantly methylated DNA bases. Genome instability and accumulation of aberrant bases accompany multiple diseases including cancer and neurological disorders. While BER is well studied on naked DNA, it is currently unclear how BER efficiently operates on chromatin. Here we show that AAG binds to chromatin and forms a complex with active RNA polymerase (pol) II. This occurs through direct binding to Elongator and results in co-regulation of gene expression. Interestingly, endogenous aberrantly methylated bases accumulate at 3’end of co-regulated genes, in regions enriched for Elongator, active RNA pol II, and BER enzymes AAG and APE1. Active transcription and functional Elongator are further vital to ensure efficient BER by promoting AAG and APE1 chromatin occupancy. Our findings indicate that AAG needs to associate with transcription elongation to maintain genome stability, concurrently coordinating repair with gene expression.
Project description:We report a new immunoprecipitation-coupled sequencing (DIP-Seq) application termed U-DNA-Seq, where a tailored and catalytically inactive uracil-DNA glycosylase (UNG) was used as uracil-DNA sensor to immunoprecipitate uracil containing genomic DNA fragments. Genomic uracil was profiled in drug-treated (5-fluoro-2'-deoxyuridine (5FdUR) or raltitrexed (RTX)) or non-treated (NT) HCT116 cells expressing the UNG inhibitor (UGI). The same experiments were also performed in the mismatch repair proficient version of the HCT116 cells (HCT116MMR), where chromosome 3 is reinserted to restore functional MMR (PMID: 8044777). Moreover, wild-type HCT116 or K562 cells were also measured. We found that regions of uracil enrichment in this assay were rather broad as compared to the sharp peaks typical in ChIP-seq. Therefore, we applied an approach alternative to the conventional peak calling. Namely, we calculated genome scaled coverage tracks and log2 ratio tracks of the enriched versus the input samples using deepTools package (bamCoverage and bigwigCompare tools, respectively) to provide a more appropriate description of uracil-enriched genomic regions. Interval (bed) files were also derived from these log2 ratio tracks to be able to screen large datasets for colocalizing features with them. For wider context of the study, see the related publication.