Genetics. Published Articles Ahead of Print: May 15, 2006, Copyright © 2006
doi:10.1534/genetics.106.059436


A more recent version of this article appeared on August 1, 2006.


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The Effect of Gap Length on Double-Strand Break Repair in Drosophila

1 University of Wisconsin

* To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: wrengels{at}facstaff.wisc.edu.

Submitted on April 13, 2006
Revised on May 4, 2006
Accepted on 14 May 2006


Abstract

When a double-strand break has a gap between the broken ends, the missing information can be restored through synthesis from a homologous template. Here we address the question of how long such a gap can be before this process fails. We measured the frequency of homologous repair in the Drosophila germ line following the creation of gaps of specific sizes ranging from 3.8 kb to 210 kb. We found that gaps of 11 kb or smaller can be repaired with approximately the same efficiency as breaks with no gap at all. However, a gap of 44 kb was repaired only rarely, and one of 210 kb was not repaired at a measurable frequency. We conclude that DNA gap repair is a length-limited process, but that this limitation is only important for gaps greater than 11 kb.

Key Words: DNA recombination, DNA repair, double-strand break, gap length




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