Somatic hypermutation of immunoglobulin genes: lessons from proliferating cell nuclear antigen mutant mice

Proliferating cell nuclear antigen (PCNA) encircles DNA as a ring-shaped homotrimer and, by tethering DNA polymerases to their template, PCNA serves as a critical replication factor. In contrast to high-fidelity DNA polymerases, the activation of low-fidelity translesion synthesis (TLS) DNA polymerases seems to require damage-inducible monoubiquitylation (Ub) of PCNA at lysine residue 164 (PCNA-Ub). TLS polymerases can tolerate DNA damage, i.e. they can replicate across DNA lesions. The lack of proofreading activity, however, renders TLS highly mutagenic. The advantage is that B cells use mutagenic TLS to introduce somatic mutations in immunoglobulin (Ig) genes to generate high-affinity antibodies. Given the critical role of PCNA-Ub in activating TLS and the role of TLS in establishing somatic mutations in immunoglobulin genes, we analysed the mutation spectrum of somatically mutated immunoglobulin genes in B cells from PCNA knock-in mice. A 10-fold reduction in A/T mutations is associated with a compensatory increase in G/C mutations—a phenotype similar to Polh and mismatch repair-deficient B cells. Mismatch recognition, PCNA-Ub and Polh probably act within one pathway to establish the majority of mutations at template A/T. Equally relevant, the G/C mutator(s) seems largely independent of PCNA modification.