Overlapping roles for Yen1 and Mus81 in cellular Holliday junction processing.

Eukaryotic Holliday junction (HJ) resolvases have attracted much attention recently with the identification of at least three distinct proteins that can cleave model HJs in vitro. However, the specific DNA structure(s) that these proteins act upon in the cell is unknown. Here, we describe a system in budding yeast to directly and quantitatively monitor in vivo HJ resolution. We found that Yen1 acts redundantly with Mus81, but not Slx1, to resolve a model HJ in vivo. This functional overlap specifically extends to the repair/bypass of lesions that impede the progression of replication forks but not to the repair of double-strand breaks induced by ionizing radiation. Together, these results suggest a direct role for Yen1 in the response to DNA damage and implicate overlapping HJ resolution functions of Yen1 with Mus81 during replication fork repair.