DSB structure impacts DNA recombination leading to class switching and chromosomal translocations in human B cells

Class switch recombination (CSR) requires activation-induced cytidine deaminase (AID) to trigger DNA double strand breaks (DSBs) at the immunoglobulin heavy chain (IGH) in B cells. Joining of AID-dependent DSBs within IGH facilitate CSR and effective humoral immunity, but ligation to DSBs in non-IGH chromosomes leads to chromosomal translocations. Thus, the mechanism by which AID-dependent DSBs are repaired requires careful examination. The random activity of AID in IGH leads to a spectrum of DSB structures. In this report, we investigated how DSB structure impacts end-joining leading to CSR and chromosomal translocations in human B cells, for which models of CSR are inefficient and not readily available. Using CRISPR/Cas9 to model AID-dependent DSBs in IGH and non-IGH genes, we found that DSBs with 5’ and 3’ overhangs led to increased processing during end-joining compared to blunt DSBs. We observed that 5’ overhangs were removed and 3’ overhangs were filled in at recombination junctions, suggesting that different subsets of enzymes are required for repair based on DSB polarity. Surprisingly, while Cas9-mediated switching preferentially utilized NHEJ regardless of DSB structure, A-EJ strongly preferred repairing blunt DSBs leading to translocations in the absence of NHEJ. We found that DSB polarity influenced frequency of Cas9-mediated switching and translocations more than overhang length. Lastly, recombination junctions from staggered DSBs exhibited templated insertions, suggesting iterative resection and filling in during repair. Our results demonstrate that DSB structure biases repair towards NHEJ or A-EJ to complete recombination leading to CSR and translocations, thus helping to elucidate the mechanism of genome rearrangements in human B cells.