bioRxiv preprint doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/551317; this version posted February 15, 2019. The copyright holder for this preprint (which was not certified by peer review) is the author/funder. All rights reserved. No reuse allowed without permission. Title: SWITCH 1/DYAD is a novel WINGS APART-LIKE antagonist that maintains sister chromatid cohesion in meiosis Authors: Chao Yang1, Yuki Hamamura1, Kostika Sofroni1, Franziska Böwer1, Sara Christina Stolze2, Hirofumi Nakagami2 and Arp Schnittger1,* Affiliations: 1 Department of Developmental Biology, University of Hamburg, 22609 Hamburg, Germany. 2 Max-Planck-Institute for Plant Breeding Research, 50829 Cologne, Germany. *Correspondence to:
[email protected] Mitosis and meiosis both rely on cohesin, which embraces the sister chromatids and plays a crucial role for the faithful distribution of chromosomes to daughter cells. Prior to the cleavage by Separase at anaphase onset, cohesin is largely removed from chromosomes by the non- proteolytic action of WINGS APART-LIKE (WAPL), a mechanism referred to as the prophase pathway. To prevent the premature loss of sister chromatid cohesion, WAPL is inhibited in early mitosis by Sororin. However, Sororin homologs have only been found to function as WAPL inhibitors during mitosis in vertebrates and Drosophila. Here we show that SWITCH 1/DYAD defines a novel WAPL antagonist that acts in meiosis of Arabidopsis. Crucially, SWI1 becomes dispensable for sister chromatid cohesion in the absence of WAPL. Despite the lack of any seQuence similarities, we found that SWI1 is regulated and functions in a similar 1 bioRxiv preprint doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/551317; this version posted February 15, 2019.