Conversion-Type and Restoration-Type Repair of DNA Mismatches Formed During Meiotic Recombination in Saccharomyces cerevisiae

Corresponding author: Thomas D. Petes, Department of Biology, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, NC 27599-3280., tompetes{at}email.unc.edu (E-mail).

Communicating editor: M. LICHTEN

Meiotic recombination in yeast is associated with heteroduplex formation. Heteroduplexes formed between nonidentical DNA strands contain DNA mismatches, and most DNA mismatches in wild-type strains are efficiently corrected. Although some patterns of mismatch correction result in non-Mendelian segregation of the heterozygous marker (gene conversion), one predicted pattern of correction (restoration-type repair) results in normal Mendelian segregation. Using a yeast strain in which a marker leading to a well-repaired mismatch is flanked by markers that lead to poorly repaired mismatches, we present direct evidence for restoration-type repair in yeast. In addition, we find that the frequency of tetrads with conversion-type repair is higher for a marker at the 5' end of the HIS4 gene than for a marker in the middle of the gene. These results suggest that the ratio of conversion-type to restoration-type repair may be important in generating gradients of gene conversion (polarity gradients).

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