Barrier to Autointegration Factor (BANF1): interwoven roles in nuclear structure, genome integrity, innate immunity, stress responses and progeria

Abstract

The Barrier to Autointegration Factor (BAF or BANF1) is an abundant, highly conserved DNA binding protein. BAF is involved in multiple pathways including mitosis, nuclear assembly, viral infection, chromatin and gene regulation and the DNA damage response. BAF is also essential for early development in metazoans and relevant to human physiology; BANF1 mutations cause a progeroid syndrome, placing BAF within the laminopathy disease spectrum. This review summarizes previous knowledge about BAF in the context of recent discoveries about its protein partners, posttranslational regulation, dynamic subcellular localizations and roles in disease, innate immunity, transposable elements and genome integrity.

SIRT2 regulates nuclear envelope reassembly through ANKLE2 deacetylation

“…BAF is known as an essential DNA-binding protein, which interacts with a distinct structural motif termed the LAP2–Emerin–MAN1 (LEM) domain, thereby establishing connections between chromatin and a family of proteins containing a LEM domain (Jamin and Wiebe, 2015). Although the nuclear envelope breaks down in prophase, the ER network remains intact and recycles tubular material for nuclear envelope reassembly in telophase (Anderson and Hetzer, 2008).…”

Lamina-Associated Domains: Links with Chromosome Architecture, Heterochromatin, and Gene Repression

“…Because the small protein Barrier-to-autointegration (BAF/BANF1) can interact both with chromatin and with LEM-domain containing proteins that are part of the NL, BAF also has been suggested to link chromatin to the NL (Jamin and Wiebe, 2015). BAF preferentially associates with LADs, yet knockdown of BAF surprisingly caused no detectable decrease or a slight increase in LAD – NL interactions (Kind and van Steensel, 2014; Zullo et al, 2012), suggesting that BAF does not help to anchor LADs to the NL during interphase.…”

Cell Biology of theCaenorhabditis elegansNucleus

“…The C. elegans homolog of BAF is BAF-1 (Figure 2A). BAF is a conserved small (10 kDa) DNA binding protein with roles in numerous nuclear processes (Jamin and Wiebe 2015). As in other organisms, in C. elegans BAF-1 associates with the lamin protein LMN-1 and the LEMdomain proteins EMR-1 and LEM-2.…”