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Review|Volume 11, Issue 8|pp 2488—2511

A role of the 53BP1 protein in genome protection: structural and functional characteristics of 53BP1-dependent DNA repair

Eva Bártová1, Soňa Legartová1, Miroslav Dundr2, Jana Suchánková1
  • 1Institute of Biophysics of the Czech Academy of Sciences, 612 65 Brno, Czech Republic
  • 2Rosalind Franklin University of Medicine and Science, Chicago Medical School, Department of Cell Biology, North Chicago, IL 60064, USA
Received: January 6, 2019Accepted: April 10, 2019Published: April 17, 2019
https://doi.org/10.18632/aging.101917

Copyright: Bártová et al. This is an open‐access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY 3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

Abstract

Nuclear architecture plays a significant role in DNA repair mechanisms. It is evident that proteins involved in DNA repair are compartmentalized in not only spontaneously occurring DNA lesions or ionizing radiation-induced foci (IRIF), but a specific clustering of these proteins can also be observed within the whole cell nucleus. For example, 53BP1-positive and BRCA1-positive DNA repair foci decorate chromocenters and can appear close to nuclear speckles. Both 53BP1 and BRCA1 are well-described factors that play an essential role in double-strand break (DSB) repair. These proteins are members of two protein complexes: 53BP1-RIF1-PTIP and BRCA1-CtIP, which make a “decision” determining whether canonical nonhomologous end joining (NHEJ) or homology-directed repair (HDR) is activated. It is generally accepted that 53BP1 mediates the NHEJ mechanism, while HDR is activated via a BRCA1-dependent signaling pathway. Interestingly, the 53BP1 protein appears relatively quickly at DSB sites, while BRCA1 is functional at later stages of DNA repair, as soon as the Mre11-Rad50-Nbs1 complex is recruited to the DNA lesions. A function of the 53BP1 protein is also linked to a specific histone signature, including phosphorylation of histone H2AX (γH2AX) or methylation of histone H4 at the lysine 20 position (H4K20me); therefore, we also discuss an epigenetic landscape of 53BP1-positive DNA lesions.