Replication stress induced by CCNE1 overexpression creates a dependency on XRCC2 at the replication fork

Across multiple cancer types, genome instability has been linked to aberrant over-expression of CCNE1 due to premature cell cycle entry and replication stress. Using a gain-of-function screen, we found that XRCC2 cooperates with CCNE1 in the neoplastic transformation of TP53 mutant cells. A pan-cancer analysis of TCGA data revealed a striking correlation between CCNE1 and XRCC2 expression and knockdown of XRCC2 in Cyclin E1 overexpressing cell lines is synthetic lethal. Immunopurification of XRCC2 showed that it interacts with the Minichromosome Maintenance Complex Component 7 (MCM7) protein. This interaction appears to be critical for protecting replication forks as knockdown of XRCC2 leads to a strong increase in MCM7 ubiquitination with concomitant decrease in MCM7 protein levels, and reduced replication fork speed. Importantly, Overexpression of MCM7 rescues the effect of XRCC2 knockdown. Our data describe a new dependency of Cyclin E1 overexpressing tumors on factors that stabilize the replication fork.