Description
Product Characteristics:
Cysteine protease required for the cytoplasm to vacuole transport (Cvt) and autophagy. Cleaves the C-terminal amino acid of ATG8 family proteins MAP1LC3, GABARAPL1, GABARAPL2 and GABARAP, to reveal a C-terminal glycine. Exposure of the glycine at the C-terminus is essential for ATG8 proteins conjugation to phosphatidylethanolamine (PE) and insertion to membranes, which is necessary for autophagy. Has also an activity of delipidating enzyme for the PE-conjugated forms.
Subcellular location: Cytoplasm
Synonyms: APG4B, AUTL1, Cysteine protease ATG4B, AUT-like 1 cysteine endopeptidase, Autophagin-1, Autophagy-related cysteine endopeptidase 1, Autophagy-related protein 4 homolog B, hAPG4B, ATG4B, KIAA0943
Target Information: Autophagy is the process by which endogenous proteins and damaged organelles are destroyed intracellularly. Autophagy is postulated to be essential for cell homeostasis and cell remodeling during differentiation, metamorphosis, non-apoptotic cell death, and aging. Reduced levels of autophagy have been described in some malignant tumors, and a role for autophagy in controlling the unregulated cell growth linked to cancer has been proposed. This gene encodes a member of the autophagin protein family. The encoded protein is also designated as a member of the C-54 family of cysteine proteases. Alternate transcriptional splice variants, encoding different isoforms, have been characterized. [provided by RefSeq, Jul 2008]