Key result
Drosophila Wash influences global nuclear architecture, expanding potential nuclear roles for WAS proteins.
Why the study?
The roles of Wiskott Aldrich Syndrome family proteins in the nucleus, beyond their cytoplasmic functions, remain to be fully characterized.
Summarizes the regulation and function of nuclear WAS proteins, highlighting the role of Drosophila Wash in global nuclear architecture.
Expands nuclear roles of WAS proteins beyond transcription; leaves open relevance to human cardiovascular disease.
Actin and proteins that regulate its dynamics or interactions have well-established roles in the cytoplasm where they function as key components of the cytoskeleton to control diverse processes, including cellular infrastructure, cellular motility, cell signaling, and vesicle transport. Recent work has also uncovered roles for actin and its regulatory proteins in the nucleus, primarily in mechanisms governing gene expression. The Wiskott Aldrich Syndrome (WAS) family of proteins, comprising the WASP/N-WASP, SCAR/WAVE, WHAMM/JMY/WHAMY, and WASH subfamilies, function in the cytoplasm where they activate the Arp2/3 complex to form branched actin filaments. WAS proteins are present in the nucleus and have been implicated as transcriptional regulators. We found that Drosophila Wash, in addition to transcriptional effects, is involved in global nuclear architecture. Here we summarize the regulation and function of nuclear WAS proteins, and highlight how our work with Wash expands the possibilities for the functions of these proteins in the nucleus.
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Verboon et al. (2015) reported a review. Drosophila Wash, in addition to transcriptional effects, is involved in global nuclear architecture, expanding the possibilities for the functions of WAS proteins in the nucleus.
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