Caspase-activated DNase

DFFB
Available structures PDB Ortholog search: PDBe RCSB List of PDB id codes 1IBX
Identifiers
Aliases	DFFB, DNA fragmentation factor, 40kDa, beta polypeptide (caspase-activated DNase), CAD, CPAN, DFF-40, DFF2, DFF40, DNA fragmentation factor subunit beta
External IDs	MGI: 1196287 HomoloGene: 3241 GeneCards: DFFB
Gene ontology Molecular function • enzyme binding • nuclease activity • hydrolase activity • protein binding • deoxyribonuclease activity • protein domain specific binding • identical protein binding • disordered domain specific binding Cellular component • cytoplasm • nuclear chromatin • cytosol • nucleolus • intracellular • nucleus • nucleoplasm Biological process • apoptotic DNA fragmentation • apoptotic chromosome condensation • apoptotic process • DNA catabolic process • protein homooligomerization Sources:Amigo / QuickGO
RNA expression pattern
More reference expression data
Orthologs
Species	Human	Mouse
Entrez	1677	13368
Ensembl	ENSG00000169598	ENSMUSG00000029027
UniProt	O76075	O54788
RefSeq (mRNA)	NM_001004285 NM_001004286 NM_001282669 NM_004402 NM_001320132 NM_001320136	NM_007859
RefSeq (protein)	NP_001269598 NP_001307061 NP_001307065 NP_004393	NP_031885.3 NP_031885
Location (UCSC)	Chr 1: 3.86 – 3.89 Mb	Chr 4: 153.96 – 153.98 Mb
PubMed search

DNA fragmentation factor 40 kDa
crystal structure of caspase-activated dnase (cad)
Identifiers
Symbol	DFF40
Pfam	PF09230
InterPro	IPR015311
SCOP	1v0d
SUPERFAMILY	1v0d
Available protein structures: Pfam structures PDB RCSB PDB; PDBe; PDBj PDBsum structure summary

1IBX

1677

13368

ENSG00000169598

ENSMUSG00000029027

O76075

O54788

NM_001320136

NM_007859

NP_001269598
NP_001307061
NP_001307065
NP_004393

NP_031885.3
NP_031885

Caspase-Activated DNase (CAD) or DNA fragmentation factor subunit beta is a protein that in humans is encoded by the DFFB gene. It breaks up the DNA during apoptosis and promotes cell differentiation. It is usually an inactive monomer inhibited by ICAD. This is cleaved before dimerization.

Apoptosis is a cell death process that removes toxic and/or useless cells during mammalian development. The apoptotic process is accompanied by shrinkage and fragmentation of the cells and nuclei and degradation of the chromosomal DNA into nucleosomal units. DNA fragmentation factor (DFF) is a heterodimeric protein of 40-kD (DFFB) and 45-kD (DFFA) subunits. DFFA is the substrate for caspase-3 and triggers DNA fragmentation during apoptosis. DFF becomes activated when DFFA is cleaved by caspase-3. The cleaved fragments of DFFA dissociate from DFFB, the active component of DFF. DFFB has been found to trigger both DNA fragmentation and chromatin condensation during apoptosis. Multiple alternatively spliced transcript variants encoding distinct isoforms have been found for this gene, but the biological validity of some variants has not been determined.