The protein encoded by TNFSF13 is a member of the tumor necrosis factor (TNF) ligand family. This protein (tumor necrosis factor superfamily member 13) is a ligand for TNFRSF17/BCMA, a member of the TNF receptor family. This protein and its receptor are both found to be important for B cell development. In vitro experiments suggested that this protein may be able to induce apoptosis through its interaction with other TNF receptor family proteins such as TNFRSF6/FAS and TNFRSF14/HVEM. Alternative splicing results in multiple transcript variants. Some transcripts that skip the last exon of the upstream gene (TNFSF12) and continue into the second exon of TNFSF13 have been identified; such read-through transcripts are contained in GeneID 407977, TNFSF12-TNFSF13.