B-cell CLL/lymphoma 6 by this gene is a zinc finger transcription factor and contains an N-terminal POZ domain. This protein acts as a sequence-specific repressor of transcription, and has been shown to modulate the transcription of START-dependent IL-4 responses of B cells. This protein can interact with a variety of POZ-containing proteins that function as transcription corepressors. This gene is found to be frequently translocated and hypermutated in diffuse large-cell lymphoma (DLCL), and may be involved in the pathogenesis of DLCL. Alternatively spliced transcript variants encoding different protein isoforms have been found for this gene.

BCL6 functions as a transcriptional repressor and is necessary for germinal center formation. Approximately 40% of diffuse large cell lymphomas and 5 to 10% of follicular lymphomas are associated with chromosomal translocations that deregulate expression of BCL6 by juxtaposing heterologous promoters to the BCL6 coding domain