Identification and Partial Characterization of Fanconi Anemia Associated Polypeptides (FAAPs) Using a Versatile Multiprotein-Complex Purification Method.

Fanconi Anemia (FA) is an autosomal recessive and X-linked disorder characterized by congenital abnormalities, progressive bone marrow failure, and a high incidence of hematological (acute leukemia) and non-hematological malignancies (squamous cell carcinomas of the head and neck or gynecologic system). FA is genetically heterogeneous disease and to date 12 complementation groups are known of which 11 gene products have been identified (FANC- A, B, C, D1, D2, E, F, G, J, L, M). Eight of the FA gene products, FANCA, FANCB, FANC, FANCE, FANCF, FANCG, FANCL and FANCM form a multiprotein FA core complex. This complex is required for the monoubiquitination of FANCD2 upon DNA damage by various genotoxic agents. The other two FA proteins; FANCD1/BRCA2 and FANCJ are believed to act “downstream” of FANCD2. In order to understand the role of FA proteins in DNA repair pathway it is necessary to find all the FA genes and their interacting partners. We have established a two-step purification method using 6XHis and FLAG tags for the biochemical and functional characterization of the FA core complex proteins. In an attempt to isolate interacting partners of FANCM and FANCL proteins; we have established two different HeLa cell lines; HeLa-HF-FANCM and HeLa-HF-FANCL, stably expressing HF-FANCM and HF-FANCL recombinant proteins respectively. Two step affinity purification was carried out to isolate the complexes from the extracts prepared from stable cell lines. Two polypeptides, namely, FAAP16 and FAAP100 were identified by mass-spectrometry as major interacting partners of FANCM and FANCL respectively. The interaction of FAAP16 and FAAP100 with other FA core complex proteins was confirmed by reciprocal affinity purification coupled mass-spectrometry using HeLa cells stably expressing HF-FAAP16 and HF-FAAP100 proteins. Furthermore, suppression of FAAP16 and FAAP100 in HeLa cells using siRNA resulted in a reduced MMC-induced FANCD2 monoubiquitination. Studies are being carried out to understand the precise role of these proteins in the FA core complex. These data suggest additional proteins interact with FA core complex members and demonstrate the utility of the purification method in delineating interacting proteins involved in FA.