Effect of tif expression, irradiation of recipient and presence of plasmid pKM101 on recovery of a marker from a donor exposed to ultraviolet light prior to conjugation

To detect the effect of the postulated inducible error-prone repair system ('SOS repair') on the bacterial chromosome an Hfr Escherichia coli strain JC5088 rec A was u.v.-irradiated immediately before mating it with recipients in which SOS repair was supposed to be functioning either through tif expression, u.v. irradiation or the presence of plasmid pKM101. The recombinant yields of these crosses were compared with those obtained in corresponding crosses with recipients in which SOS repair either was not induced or was totally eliminated by the lexA mutation. No difference in marker recovery efficiency could be detected between these two sets of recipients and thus no induced repair process acting on donor DNA could be demonstrated. The possible reasons for this finding are discussed. (author)