Description
Mammalian apolipoprotein B mRNA undergoes site-specific C to U deamination, which is mediated by a multi-component enzyme complex containing a minimal core composed of APOBEC-1 and a complementation factor encoded by this gene. The gene product has three non-identical RNA recognition motifs and belongs to the hnRNP R family of RNA-binding proteins. It has been proposed that this complementation factor functions as an RNA-binding subunit and docks APOBEC-1 to deaminate the upstream cytidine. Studies suggest that the protein may also be involved in other RNA editing or RNA processing events. Alternative splicing occurs at this locus and three full-length transcript variants, encoding three distinct isoforms, have been described. Additional splicing has been observed but the full-length nature of these variants has not been determined