Molecular characterization of mutant alleles of the DNA repair basal transcription factor haywire/ERCC3 in Drosophila

The haywire gene of Drosophila encodes a putative helicase essential for transcription and nucleotide excision repair. A haywire allele encoding a dominant acting poison product, lethal alleles, and viable but UV-sensitive alleles isolated as revertants of the dominant acting poison allele were molecularly characterized. Sequence analysis of lethal hagwire alleles revealed the importance of the nucleotide-binding domain, suggesting an essential role for ATPase activity. The viable hay(nc2) allele, which encodes a poison product, has a single amino acid change in conserved helicase domain VI. This mutation results in accumulation of a 68-kD polypeptide that is much more abundant than the wild-type haywire protein.