Expression of the bacterial recA gene impairs genetic recombination and sporulation in a Saccharomyces cerevisiae diploid strain

• Main Authors: Marcos Antonio de Morais Junior, José Ferreira dos Santos, João Antonio Pegas Henriques
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Sociedade Brasileira de Genética 2003-01-01
• Series: Genetics and Molecular Biology
• Subjects: DNA repair; genetic recombination; recA gene; sporulation; yeast
• Online Access: http://www.scielo.br/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S1415-47572003000200016

The Escherichia coli RecA protein (RecAp) has been demonstrated to induce mutagenesis in yeast cells, although there is still little information on the role of the RecAp in yeast recombination events. We evaluated spontaneous and induced general recombination in vegetative and meiotic cells of the XS2316 strain of the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae bearing the recA gene. We found that RecAp decreased reciprocal recombination, gene conversion and intrachromosomal recombination and promoted an increase in error-prone processes in both vegetative and meiotic cells, while its negative effect on meiotic recombination blocked ascospore formation.