Radiation damage to DNA-protein complexes

We review here the advances in understanding the effects of ionizing radiations on DNA, proteins and their complexes, resulting from the collaboration of the authors’ teams. It concerns the preponderant indirect effect of low LET ionizing radiations, thus the attack of the macromolecules in aqueous solution by the most aggressive product of water radiolysis, the hydroxyl radical. A model of simulation of the reaction of these radicals with the macromolecules (called RADACK) was developed and was used for calculating the probabilities of damage of each constituent of DNA or proteins (nucleotide or amino-acid). The calculations allowed to draw conclusions from electrophoresis, mutagenesis, spectroscopic (fluorescence, circular dichroïsm) and mass spectrometry experiments. Thus we have shown that the extent and location of the lesions are strongly dependent on the 3D structure of the macromolecules, which in turns is modulated by their sequence and by the binding of some ligands. Molecular dynamics simulation completed our studies in showing the consequences of each lesion on the stability and structure of the proteins and their complexes with DNA.