DNA repair protein RAD50 (RAD50)

Component of the MRN complex, which plays a central role in double-strand break (DSB) repair, DNA recombination, maintenance of telomere integrity and meiosis. The complex possesses single-strand endonuclease activity and double-strand- specific 3'-5' exonuclease activity, which are supplied by MRE11.

RAD50 could be asked to bind DNA ends and hold them in close proximity. This could facilitate searches for short or long regions of sequence homology in the recombining DNA templates, and may also stimulate the activity of DNA ligases or restrict the nuclease activity of MRE11 to prevent nucleolytic degradation past a given point (PubMed:11741547, PubMed:9590181, PubMed:9705271, PubMed:9651580).