Kaiso belongs to the zinc finger and broad-complex, tramtrack and bric-a-brac/poxvirus and zinc finger (BTB/POZ) protein family that has been implicated in tumorigenesis.
Kaiso was first discovered in a complex with the armadillo-domain protein p120ctn and later shown to function as a transcriptional repressor.
As p120ctn seems to relieve Kaiso-mediated repression, its altered intracellular localization in some cancer cells might result in aberrant Kaiso nuclear activity. Intriguingly, Kaiso’s target genes include both methylated and sequence-specific recognition sites. The latter include genes that are modulated by the canonical Wnt (beta-catenin-T-cell factor) signalling pathway.
References
van Roy FM, McCrea PD. A role for Kaiso-p120ctn complexes in cancer? Nat Rev Cancer. 2005 Dec;5(12):956-64. PMID: 16294216