TREX2 Exonuclease Causes Spontaneous Mutations and Stress-Induced Replication Fork Defects in Cells Expressing...

DNA damage tolerance (DDT) and homologous recombination (HR) stabilize replication forks (RFs). RAD18/UBC13/three prime repair exonuclease 2 (TREX2)-mediated proliferating cell nuclear antigen (PCNA) ubiquitination is central to DDT, an error-prone lesion bypass pathway. RAD51 is the recombinase for HR. The RAD51 K133A mutation increased spontaneous mutations and stress-induced RF stalls and nascent strand degradation. Here, we report in RAD51^K133A cells that this phenotype is reduced by expressing a TREX2 H188A mutation that deletes its exonuclease activity. In RAD51^K133A cells, knocking out RAD18 or overexpressing PCNA reduces spontaneous mutations, while expressing ubiquitination-incompetent PCNA^K164R increases mutations, indicating DDT as causal. Deleting TREX2 in cells deficient for the RF maintenance proteins poly(ADP-ribose) polymerase 1 (PARP1) or FANCB increased nascent strand degradation that was rescued by TREX2^H188A, implying that TREX2 prohibits degradation independent of catalytic activity. A possible explanation for this occurrence is that TREX2^H188A associates with UBC13 and ubiquitinates PCNA, suggesting a dual role for TREX2 in RF maintenance.