The resistance of DMC1 D-loops to dissociation may account for the DMC1 requirement in meiosis

The ubiquitously expressed Rad51 and the meiosis-specific Dmc1 recombinases promote the formation of strand invasion products (D-loops) between homologous molecules. Strand invasion products are processed by either the double strand break repair (DSBR) or synthesis-dependent strand annealing (SDSA) pathway. D-loops destined to being processed by SDSA need to dissociate producing noncrossovers (NCOs) and those destined for DSBR should resist dissociation to generate crossovers (COs). The mechanism that channels recombination intermediates into different HR pathways is unknown. Here we demonstrate that D-loops in a DMC1 driven reaction are substantially more resistant to dissociation by branch migration proteins such as RAD54, than those formed by RAD51. We propose that the intrinsic resistance to dissociation of DMC1 strand invasion intermediates may account for why DMC1 is essential to ensure the proper segregation of chromosomes in meiosis.