Schizosaccharomyces pombe Rtf2 is important for replication fork barrier activity of RTS1 via splicing of Rtf1

Arrested replication forks, when restarted by homologous recombination, result in error-prone DNA syntheses and non-allelic homologous recombination. Fission yeast RTS1 is a model fork barrier used to probe mechanisms of recombination-dependent restart. RTS1 barrier activity is entirely dependent on the DNA binding protein Rtf1 and partially dependent on a second protein, Rtf2. Human RTF2 was recently implicated in fork restart, leading us to examine fission yeast Rtf2’s role in more detail. In agreement with previous studies, we observe reduced barrier activity upon rtf2 deletion. However, we identified Rtf2 to be physically associated with mRNA processing and splicing factors and rtf2 deletion to cause increased intron retention. One of the most affected introns resided in the rtf1 transcript. Using an intronless rtf1, we observed no reduction in RFB activity in the absence of Rtf2. Thus, Rtf2 is essential for correct rtf1 splicing to allow optimal RTS1 barrier activity.