The BAH (bromo-adjacent homology) domain: a link between DNA methylation, replication and transcriptional regulation

Using sensitive methods of sequence analysis including hydrophobic cluster analysis, we report here a hitherto undescribed family of modules, the BAH (bromo-adjacent homology) family, which includes proteins such as eukaryotic DNA (cytosine-5) methyltransferases, the origin recognition complex 1 (Orc1) proteins, as well as several proteins involved in transcriptional regulation. The BAH domain appears to act as a protein-protein interaction module specialized in gene silencing, as suggested for example by its interaction within yeast Orc1p with the silent information regulator Sir1p. The BAH module might therefore play an important role by linking DNA methylation, replication and transcriptional regulation.