Three additional genes involved in pyrimidine dimer removal in Saccharomyces cerevisiae: RAD7, RAD14 and MMS19

The ability to remove ultraviolet (UV)-induced pyrimidine dimers from the nuclear DNA of yeast was examined in two radiation-sensitive (rad) mutants and one methyl methanesulfonate-sensitive (mms) mutant of the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae. The susceptibility of DNA from irradiated cells to nicking by an endonuclease activity prepared from crude extracts of Micrococcus luteus was used to measure the presence of dimers in DNA. The rad7, rad14 and mms19 mutants were found to be defective in their ability to remove UV-induced dimers from nuclear DNA. All three mutants belong to the same epistatic group as the other mutants involved in excision-repair. All three mutants show enhanced UV-induced mutations. The rad14 mutant also shows epistatic interactions with genes in the other two UV repair pathways.