Meiotic silencing by unpaired DNA is atypically efficient in the standard OR genetic background of Neurospora crassa

Meiotic silencing by unpaired DNA (MSUD) was discovered in crosses made in the standard Oak Ridge (OR) genetic background of Neurospora crassa. However, MSUD often was decidedly less efficient when the OR-derived MSUD tester strains were crossed with wild-isolated strains (W), which suggested either that sequence heterozygosity in tester x W crosses suppresses MSUD, or that OR represents the MSUD-conducive extreme in the range of genetic variation in MSUD efficiency. Our results support the latter model. MSUD was much less efficient in near-isogenic crosses made in a novel N. crassa B/S1 and the N. tetrasperma 85 genetic backgrounds. Possibly, additional regulatory cues that in other genetic backgrounds calibrate the MSUD response are missing from OR. The OR versus B/S1 difference appears to be determined by loci on chromosomes 1, 2, and 5. OR crosses heterozygous for a chromosome segment duplication (Dp) have for long been known to exhibit an MSUD-dependent barren phenotype. However, inefficient MSUD in N. tetrasperma 85 made Dp-heterozygous crosses non-barren. This is germane to our earlier demonstration that Dps can act as dominant suppressors of repeat-induced point mutation (RIP). Occasionally, during ascospore partitioning rare asci contained >8 nuclei, and round ascospores dispersed less efficiently than spindle-shaped ones.