Mutagenesis and epistatic grouping of the Neurospora meiotic mutants, mei-2 and mei-3, which are sensitive to mutagens.

To understand the possible roles of the Neurospora meiotic genes mei-2 and mei-3 in DNA repair, the frequencies of spontaneous and UV-induced mutation at the ad-3 loci were investigated and double mutants between mei mutants and other DNA-repair mutants were analyzed for mutagen sensitivity. Spontaneous mutation frequency in mei-2 was similar to that of the wild type, while the frequencies were high in both of two mei-3 strains which contained different mei-3 alleles. In addition, the frequency of spontaneous mutation in mei-3 varied greatly from experiment to experiment, which clearly showed a mutator phenotype for mei-3 mutation. UV irradiation increased mutation frequencies in both mei-2 and mei-3. The mutagen sensitivity of the double mutant, mei-2 mei-3, was no greater than that of the single mutants when treated with UV and methyl methanesulfonate (MMS). Thus, both mei genes appear to be involved in the same repair group. When analyzed in combination with other mutations, both mei mutations showed an epistatic relationship to uvs-6 and a synergistic relationship to mus-18 and uvs-2. However, uvs-3 was epistatic to mei-2, but the relationship of uvs-3 to mei-3 could not be tested directly, because the double mutant was barely viable. These results indicate that mei-2 and mei-3 are involved in the same repair group as uvs-6, and uvs-3 is possibly involved in the same group. Alternatively, the mei genes, or uvs-3 itself, may be related to more than one DNA repair group.