title: Telomere maintenance through recruitment of internal genomic regions.
abstract: Cells surviving crisis are often tumorigenic and their telomeres are commonly maintained through the reactivation of telomerase. However, surviving cells occasionally activate a recombination-based mechanism called alternative lengthening of telomeres (ALT). Here we establish stably maintained survivors in telomerase-deleted Caenorhabditis elegans that escape from sterility by activating ALT. ALT survivors trans-duplicate an internal genomic region, which is already cis-duplicated to chromosome ends, across the telomeres of all chromosomes. These 'Template for ALT' (TALT) regions consist of a block of genomic DNA flanked by telomere-like sequences, and are different between two genetic background. We establish a model that an ancestral duplication of a donor TALT region to a proximal telomere region forms a genomic reservoir ready to be incorporated into telomeres on ALT activation.
authors.affiliation: Department of Biological Sciences, Institute of Molecular Biology and Genetics, Seoul National University, Seoul 08826, Korea.
authors.forename: Beomseok
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Seo
authors.affiliation: Department of Biological Sciences, Institute of Molecular Biology and Genetics, Seoul National University, Seoul 08826, Korea.
authors.forename: Chuna
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Kim
authors.affiliation: Terry Fox Laboratory, BC Cancer Agency, Vancouver, Canada V5Z 1L3.
authors.forename: Mark
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Hills
authors.affiliation: Department of Biological Sciences, Institute of Molecular Biology and Genetics, Seoul National University, Seoul 08826, Korea.
authors.forename: Sanghyun
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Sung
authors.affiliation: Department of Biological Sciences, Institute of Molecular Biology and Genetics, Seoul National University, Seoul 08826, Korea.
authors.forename: Hyesook
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Kim
authors.affiliation: Department of Biological Sciences, Institute of Molecular Biology and Genetics, Seoul National University, Seoul 08826, Korea.
authors.forename: Eunkyeong
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Kim
authors.affiliation: Department of Biological Sciences, Institute of Molecular Biology and Genetics, Seoul National University, Seoul 08826, Korea.
authors.forename: Daisy S
authors.initials: DS
authors.lastname: Lim
authors.affiliation: Department of Biological Sciences, Bioinformatics Institute, BIO-MAX, Seoul National University, Seoul 08826, Korea.
authors.forename: Hyun-Seok
authors.initials: HS
authors.lastname: Oh
authors.affiliation: Department of Biological Sciences, Bioinformatics Institute, BIO-MAX, Seoul National University, Seoul 08826, Korea.
authors.forename: Rachael Mi Jung
authors.initials: RMJ
authors.lastname: Choi
authors.affiliation: Department of Biological Sciences, Bioinformatics Institute, BIO-MAX, Seoul National University, Seoul 08826, Korea.
authors.forename: Jongsik
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Chun
authors.affiliation: Research Institute, National Cancer Center, Goyang, Gyeonggi 10408, Korea.
authors.forename: Jaegal
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Shim
authors.affiliation: Department of Biological Sciences, Institute of Molecular Biology and Genetics, Seoul National University, Seoul 08826, Korea.|Department of Biophysics and Chemical Biology, Seoul National University, Seoul 08826, Korea.
authors.forename: Junho
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Lee
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D030801:Animals, Genetically Modified; D015139:Blotting, Southern; D017173:Caenorhabditis elegans; D029742:Caenorhabditis elegans Proteins / Q000235:genetics*; D004247:DNA / Q000235:genetics*; D017404:In Situ Hybridization, Fluorescence; D011995:Recombination, Genetic / Q000235:genetics*; D019098:Telomerase / Q000235:genetics*; D059505:Telomere Homeostasis / Q000235:genetics*
chemical_list: D029742:Caenorhabditis elegans Proteins; D004247:DNA; D019098:Telomerase