Base damage and single-strand break repair: Mechanisms and functional significance of short- and long-patch repair subpathways

• Published in: DNA repair Vol. 6; no. 4; pp. 398 - 409
• Main Authors: Fortini, Paola, Dogliotti, Eugenia
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Netherlands Elsevier B.V 01-04-2007
• Subjects: Animals; Base damage; Base excision repair; Base Sequence; DNA Breaks, Single-Stranded; DNA Damage - genetics; DNA Repair - genetics; DNA Repair Enzymes - metabolism; Environment; Mice; Mice, Mutant Strains; Short and long-patch repair; Short and long-patch repair; Base excision repair; Base damage
• ISSN: 1568-7864; 1568-7856
• DOI: 10.1016/j.dnarep.2006.10.008

A large variety of DNA lesions induced by environmental agents or arising as an outcome of cellular metabolism are counteracted by a complex network of proteins that belong to the base excision repair/single strand break repair (BER/SSBR) processes. No matter whether the initial lesions are modified DNA bases or single-strand breaks with non-conventional termini these processes are completed either by replacement of a single (short-patch, SP) or more (long-patch, LP) nucleotides by different arrays of proteins. Here, the factors that are involved in the selection between SP- and LP-BER/SSBR are reviewed. The biological significance of these alternative subpathways is also presented as inferred from mutant mouse/cell models.