BCL6 evolved in vertebrates as a stress tolerance gene and is broadly used by cancer cells to adapt to stress

We have found that BCL6 is a component of the conserved stress response program regulated by HSF1. BCL6 mediates cellular adaptation to stress by repressing genes through its BTB domain. These genes fail to be repressed after stress in a murine model with point mutations in the BCL6 BTB domain that disrupt its repressor activity. Overall design: Splenic B220+ cells from wild-type and BCL6BTBmut mice were heat shocked for 12 hs. Total RNA was harvested from cells before and 12 h after heat shock and used for expression profiling via mRNA-seq.