| Abstract |
Ozone, an atmospheric pollutant, can damage similar UV and X-rays DNA and its components. It is possible then that the KNA damage produced by this gas are similar, to some extent, to those of radiations and that they could be repaired by the same DNA repair mechanisms. It has been observed in Escherichia coli that radiosensitive strains such as lex A, rec A and pol A, all deficient to some extent for DNA repair, are more sensitive to ozone than a wild type strain. We have thendetermined the ozone resistance and host-cell reactivation of ozone-damaged T3 phages for the E. coli double mutants pol A, lex A, uvr B, lex A, uvr A, rec A and rec A lox A. According to the results, the DNA polymerase 1 plays a key role in ozone resistance and Type 11 mechanism and/or short patch excision repair are the most important for it. The interactions between the different DNA repair mechanisms are secondary. There is a strong correlation between ozone resistance and the capacity to reactivate T3 phages damaged by ozone. |
