Homologous recombination at the border: Insertion-deletions and the trapping of foreign DNA in Streptococcus pneumoniae - Université de Lorraine
Journal Articles Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America Year : 2002

Homologous recombination at the border: Insertion-deletions and the trapping of foreign DNA in Streptococcus pneumoniae

Abstract

Integration of foreign DNA was observed in the Gram-positive human pathogen Streptococcus pneumoniae (pneumococcus) after transformation with DNA from a recombinant Escherichia coli bacteriophage lamda carrying a pneumococcal insert. Segments of lamda DNA replaced chromosomal sequences adjacent to the region homologous with the pneumococcal insert, whence the name insertion-deletion. Here we report that a pneumococcal insert was absolutely required for insertion-deletion formation, but could be as short as 153 bp; that the sizes of foreign DNA insertions (289-2,474 bp) and concomitant chromosomal deletions (45-1,485 bp) were not obviously correlated; that novel joints clustered preferentially within segments of high GC content; and that the crossovers in 29 independent novel joints were located 1 bp from the border or within short (3-10 nt long) stretches of identity (microhomology) between resident and foreign DNA. The data are consistent with a model in which the insert serving as a homologous recombination anchor favors interaction and subsequent illegitimate recombination events at microhomologies between foreign and resident sequences. The potential of homology- directed illegitimate recombination for genome evolution was illustrated by the trapping of functional heterologous genes.

Dates and versions

hal-01797918 , version 1 (22-05-2018)

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Marc Prudhomme, Virginie Libante, Jean-Pierre Claverys. Homologous recombination at the border: Insertion-deletions and the trapping of foreign DNA in Streptococcus pneumoniae. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 2002, 99 (4), pp.2100 - 2105. ⟨10.1073/pnas.032262999⟩. ⟨hal-01797918⟩
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