Search

Microbes produce a broad spectrum of antibiotic natural products, including many DNA-damaging genotoxins. Among the most potent of these are DNA alkylating agents in the spirocyclopropylcyclohexadienone (SCPCHD) family, which includes the duocarmycins, CC-1065, gilvusmycin, and yatakemycin. The yatakemycin biosynthesis cluster in Streptomyces sp. TP-A0356 contains an AlkD-related DNA glycosylase, YtkR2, that serves as a self-resistance mechanism against yatakemycin toxicity. We previously reported that AlkD, which is not present in an SCPCHD producer, provides only limited resistance against yatakemycin. We now show that YtkR2 and C10R5, a previously uncharacterized homolog found in the CC-1065 biosynthetic gene cluster of Streptomyces zelensis, confer far greater resistance against their respective SCPCHD natural products. We identify a structural basis for substrate specificity across gene clusters and show a correlation between in vivo resistance and in vitro enzymatic activity indicating that reduced product affinity—not enhanced substrate recognition—is the evolutionary outcome of selective pressure to provide self-resistance against yatakemycin and CC-1065., Microbial DNA glycosylases associated with the biosynthesis of DNA-damaging antibiotics have evolved self-resistance for their cognate natural products. Here, the authors provide evidence that cellular self-resistance is enabled by reduced affinity of the glycosylases for the excision products of the corresponding DNA lesions.

Abasic (AP) sites are one of the most common DNA lesions that block replicative polymerases. 5-hydroxymethylcytosine binding, embryonic stem cell-specific protein (HMCES) recognizes and processes these lesions in the context of single-stranded DNA (ssDNA). A HMCES DNA-protein cross-link (DPC) intermediate is thought to shield the AP site from endonucleases and error-prone polymerases. The highly evolutionarily conserved SOS-response associated peptidase (SRAP) domain of HMCES and its Escherichia coli ortholog YedK mediate lesion recognition. Here we uncover the basis of AP site protection by SRAP domains from a crystal structure of the YedK DPC. YedK forms a stable thiazolidine linkage between a ring-opened AP site and the α-amino and sulfhydryl substituents of its amino-terminal cysteine residue. The thiazolidine linkage explains the remarkable stability of the HMCES DPC, its resistance to strand cleavage and the proteolysis requirement for resolution. Furthermore, its structure reveals that HMCES has specificity for AP sites in ssDNA at junctions found when replicative polymerases encounter the AP lesion.

DNA glycosylases that remove alkylated and deaminated purine nucleobases are essential DNA repair enzymes that protect the genome, and at the same time confound cancer alkylation therapy, by excising cytotoxic N3-methyladenine bases formed by DNA targeting anticancer compounds. The basis for glycosylase specificity toward N3- and N7-alkylpurines is believed to result from intrinsic instability of the modified bases and not from direct enzyme functional group chemistry. Here, we present crystal structures of the recently discovered Bacillus cereus AlkD glycosylase in complex with DNAs containing alkylated, mismatched, and abasic nucleotides. Unlike other glycosylases, AlkD captures the extrahelical lesion in a solvent-exposed orientation, providing the first illustration for how hydrolysis of N3- and N7-alkylated bases may be facilitated by increased lifetime out of the DNA helix. The structures and supporting biochemical analysis of base flipping and catalysis reveal how AlkD’s HEAT-repeats distort the DNA backbone to detect non-Watson-Crick base pairs without duplex intercalation.

Cytosine methylation or bromination of the DNA sequence d(GGCGCC)2 is shown here to induce a novel extended and eccentric double helix, which we call E-DNA. Like B-DNA, E-DNA has a long helical rise and bases perpendicular to the helix axis. However, the 3′-endo sugar conformation gives the characteristic deep major groove and shallow minor groove of A-DNA. Also, if allowed to crystallize for a period of time longer than that yielding E-DNA, the methylated sequence forms standard A-DNA, suggesting that E-DNA is a kinetically trapped intermediate in the transition to A-DNA. Thus, the structures presented here chart a crystallographic pathway from B-DNA to A-DNA through the E-DNA intermediate in a single sequence. The E-DNA surface is highly accessible to solvent, with waters in the major groove sitting on exposed faces of the stacked nucleotides. We suggest that the geometry of the waters and the stacked base pairs would promote the spontaneous deamination of 5-methylcytosine in the transition mutation of dm5C-dG to dT-dA base pairs.