CST interacts with the cohesin complex and promotes chromosome cohesion

Sister chromatid cohesion (SCC), the pairing of sister chromatids following DNA replication until mitosis, is established by loading of the cohesin complex on newly replicated chromatids. Cohesin must then be maintained until mitosis to prevent segregation defects and aneuploidy. However, how SCC is established and maintained until mitosis remains incompletely understood and emerging evidence suggests that replication stress may lead to premature SCC loss. Here, we report that the single-stranded DNA-binding protein CTC1-STN1-TEN1 (CST) aids in SCC. CST primarily functions in telomere length regulation but also has known roles in replication restart and DNA repair. Following depletion of CST subunits, we observed an increase in the complete loss of SCC. Additionally, we determined that CST associates with the cohesin complex. Unexpectedly, we did not find evidence of altered cohesion or mitotic progression in the absence of CST; however, we did find that treatment with various replication inhibitors increased the association between CST and cohesin. Since replication stress was recently shown to induce SCC loss, we hypothesized that CST may be required to maintain or remodel SCC following DNA replication fork stalling. In agreement with this idea, SCC loss was greatly increased in CST-depleted cells following exogenous replication stress. Based on our findings, we propose that CST aids in the maintenance of SCC at stalled replication forks to prevent premature cohesion loss.