How plants make ends meet: DNA double-strand break repair

DNA double-strand breaks (DSBs) lead to serious genomic deficiencies if lef t unrepaired. Recent studies have provided new insight into the mechanisms, the mutants and the genes involved in DSB repair in plants. These studies indicate that high fidelity DSB repair via homologous recombination is less frequent than non-homologous end-joining. Interestingly, non-homologous en d-joining in plants is more error-prone than in other species, being associ ated with various rearrangements that often include deletions and insertion s (filler DNA). We discuss the mechanism of error-prone DSB repair, which i s probably an important driving force in plant genome evolution.