TY - JOUR A1 - Terol, Javier AU - Ibanez, Victoria AU - Carbonell, Jose AU - Alonso, Roberto AU - Estornell, Leandro H. AU - Licciardello, Concetta AU - Gut, Ivo G. AU - Dopazo, Joaquín AU - Talón, Manuel T1 - Involvement of a citrus meiotic recombination TTC-repeat motif in the formation of gross deletions generated by ionizing radiation and MULE activation Y1 - 2015 SN - 1471-2164 UR - http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11939/4579 AB - Background: Transposable-element mediated chromosomal rearrangements require the involvement of two transposons and two double-strand breaks (DSB) located in close proximity. In radiobiology, DSB proximity is also a major factor contributing to rearrangements. However, the whole issue of DSB proximity remains virtually unexplored. Results: Based on DNA sequencing analysis we show that the genomes of 2 derived mutations, Arrufatina (sport) and Nero (irradiation), share a similar 2 Mb deletion of chromosome 3. A 7 kb Mutator like element found in Clemenules was present in Arrufatina in inverted orientation flanking the 5' end of the deletion. The Arrufatina Mule displayed "dissimilar" 9-bp target site duplications separated by 2 Mb. Fine-scale single nucleotide variant analyses of the deleted fragments identified a TTC-repeat sequence motif located in the center of the deletion responsible of a meiotic crossover detected in the citrus reference genome. Conclusions: Taken together, this information is compatible with the proposal that in both mutants, the TTC-repeat motif formed a triplex DNA structure generating a loop that brought in close proximity the originally distinct reactive ends. In Arrufatina, the loop brought the Mule ends nearby the 2 distinct insertion target sites and the inverted insertion of the transposable element between these target sites provoked the release of the in-between fragment. This proposal requires the involvement of a unique transposon and sheds light on the unresolved question of how two distinct sites become located in close proximity. These observations confer a crucial role to the TTC-repeats in fundamental plant processes as meiotic recombination and chromosomal rearrangements. LA - en ER -