High impact information on canavanine

• Physical analysis of the can1 mutants from sae2/com1 strains revealed that many were a novel class of chromosome rearrangement that could reflect break-induced replication (BIR) and NHEJ [1].
• Here we characterize one of these mutants that revealed an approximately 10-fold elevation in the frequency of can1 mutants among TRP1 recombinants [1].
• A system of strains and growth media was developed to allow efficient detection of forward mutation, reversion, complementation, and suppression at the canavanine-resistance (CAN1) locus of Saccharomyces cerevisiae [2].
• In contrast to previous reports in the literature, the spontaneous forward mutation rate at CAN1 did not increase during meiosis [2].

Biological context of canavanine

• Errors resulting in can1 mutations occur in <1% of the TRP1 recombinants and most appear to be point mutations [1].

References