Identifying and Characterizing Genes Involved in Telomere Length
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Tel Aviv University George S. Wise Faculty of Life Sciences Graduate School The Department of Molecular Microbiology and Biotechnology Identifying and Characterizing Genes Involved in Telomere Length Regulation in Saccharomyces cerevisiae Thesis submitted to the Senate of Tel Aviv University For the degree "Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.)" Submitted by Tal Yehuda Under the supervision of The deceased Dr. Anat Krauskopf and Prof. Martin Kupiec May 2008 עבודת המחקר שלי ארכה זמן רב, הן בגלל הנסיבות המיוחדות במעבדה והן בגלל סוג המחקר שבחרתי, לכן אני רוצה להודות לכל האנשים שליוו אותי בדרך ארוכה זו: החל מהמנחה הראשונה שלי- ענת קראוסקופף ז"ל, תודה על ההיכרות האישית והמדעית, למרטין קופייק- על הסבלנות הבלתי נלאית ללמד, לחנך ולהרביץ בי תורה, יישר כח! (תדע שהקשבתי לכל מילה), לחברי המעבדה- הישנים והחדשים, ובמיוחד לך יובל, תודה על העזרה ועל שיתוף הפעולה, למשפחתי העניפה- סבתותי, דודיי, חמיי, גיסותיי, הוריי ואחיי הנפלאים שהתעניינתם ושאלתם (גם אם ההסברים נשמעו לרוב עלומים), בעזרתכם הרבה סיימתי סוף סוף, ובמיוחד לבעלי האהוב- תודה על הכל ! וילדי היקרים לי מכל... ABSTRACT Telomeres are nucleoprotein structures present at the ends of eukaryotic chromosomes. Telomeres play a central role in guarding the integrity of the genome by protecting chromosome ends from degradation and fusion. Regulation of telomere length is central to their function. In order to broaden our knowledge about the mechanisms that control telomere length, we have carried out a systematic examination of ~4800 haploid deletion mutants of Saccharomyces cerevisiae for telomere-length alterations. Using this screen we have identified more than 150 new genes that affect telomere length. A novel array-based method for creating double mutants was used to sort the newly identified genes into epistasis groups. The genes that, when deleted, shorten the telomeres were chosen for further analysis. A panel of thirty such mutants, representing all the complexes identified in variuos genome-wide screen, was crossed to five strains with short telomeres: cdc73, dcc1, rfm1, vps34 and srb2. The results provide new insights about the mechanisms that control telomere length. 1 ABSTRACT ................................................................................................................... 1 1. INTRODUCTION ..................................................................................................... 5 1.1 Telomere function. ............................................................................................... 5 Figure 1.1: Schematic drawing of telomere composition. ..................................... 7 1.2 The role of telomeres in cancer progression and aging. ...................................... 8 1.3. Telomere length regulation. .............................................................................. 10 Figure 1.2: Schematic drawing of telomeres capping proteins from different organisms. ............................................................................................................ 22 1.4. Telomeric Silencing. ......................................................................................... 22 1.5 Modular epistasis. .............................................................................................. 26 Figure 1.3: Schematic drawing of genetic relation between genes participating in telomere length regulation. .................................................................................. 30 1.6 Genome-wide screens. ....................................................................................... 30 1.7 CDC73 ............................................................................................................... 31 1.8 DCC1 ................................................................................................................. 32 1.9 RFM1 ................................................................................................................. 33 1.10 VPS34 .............................................................................................................. 34 1.11 SRB2 ................................................................................................................ 35 2. MATERIALS AND METHODS ............................................................................. 37 2.1. Growth media.................................................................................................... 37 YEAST ................................................................................................................. 37 BACTERIA: ........................................................................................................ 38 2.2. Yeast genetics ................................................................................................... 38 2.3. S. cerevisiae strains ........................................................................................... 39 2 2.3.1. BY4741 background: ..................................................................................... 39 2.3.2. Tester strains (from the lab stock): ................................................................ 40 2.4. Plasmids ............................................................................................................ 41 2.5. PCR analysis ..................................................................................................... 41 Table 2.1- List of primers that were used for the deletion verification. .............. 42 2.6. Molecular biology techniques ........................................................................... 49 Table 2.2- Primers used for telomeric probe. ...................................................... 52 2.7. Quantification of telomere length ..................................................................... 53 3. RESULTS ................................................................................................................ 54 3.1 Isolating of TLM genes in a genomic screen. .................................................... 54 3.2 Confirming the identity of TLM mutants. ......................................................... 56 Table 3.1. List of S. cerevisiae genes that affect telomere length when deleted . 57 Figure 3.1.Representive Southern blot of mutants that alter S. cerevisiae telomere length.................................................................................................................... 63 Table 3.2: Saccharomyces cerevisiae genes that produce questionable telomere length alterations when deleted.. .......................................................................... 64 Table 3.3: Saccharomyces cerevisiae deletion mutants with heterogeneous telomere lengths. .................................................................................................. 65 3.3 Organizing genes in epistasis groups by TEA. .................................................. 66 Figure 3.2: Schematic presentation of the development of "the magic marker" 68 Figure 3.3: Working plan of TEA- Telomere Epistasis Assay. ........................... 70 3.4 TEA controls. ..................................................................................................... 70 3.5 Analyzing telomeres. ......................................................................................... 71 Figure 3.4: A representative page from the soft wear GelQuant.. ....................... 72 3 Table 3.4: Epistasis relation between 5 TEA genes and the panel of 30 short TLM genes. .......................................................................................................... 73 Figure 3.5: Schematic presentation of the epistatic relations between the TEA genes and the TLM genes. ................................................................................... 75 4. DISCUSSION .......................................................................................................... 78 4.1 The results of the genomic screen. ..................................................................... 78 4.2 Comparison of the two screens. ......................................................................... 79 4.3 TLM genes sorted in functional groups. ............................................................ 80 Figure 4.1: The different sections of the Mediator. ............................................. 83 Table 4.1: Neighboring ORFs that produce telomere length alterations when deleted. ................................................................................................................. 86 4.4 Performing Epistasis test for TLM genes. ......................................................... 88 4.5 Sorting TLM genes into epistasis groups........................................................... 91 4.6 How is CDC73 involved in telomere length regulation? ................................... 93 Figure 4.2: Schematic diagram of EST3 transcription and the involvement of Rpb9 and Cdc73 ................................................................................................... 93 5. BIBLIOGRAPHY .................................................................................................... 95 111 ........................................................................................................................... תקציר 4 1. INTRODUCTION 1.1 Telomere function. Telomeres are the specialized DNA-protein structures at the ends of eukaryotic chromosomes. The telomeric structure performs a capping function,it defines the end of the chromosome as a native edge, rather than a DNA double strand break (DSB).