Description
Product Characteristics:
Hematopoietic growth factor capable of stimulating the proliferation of lymphoid progenitors. It is important for proliferation during certain stages of B-cell maturation.
Subcellular location: Secreted
Synonyms: Il-7, hlb368, A630026I06Rik, Interleukin-7, Il7
Target Information: The protein encoded by this gene is a cytokine important for B and T cell development. This cytokine and the hepatocyte growth factor (HGF) form a heterodimer that functions as a pre-pro-B cell growth-stimulating factor. This cytokine is found to be a cofactor for V(D)J rearrangement of the T cell receptor beta (TCRB) during early T cell development. This cytokine can be produced locally by intestinal epithelial and epithelial goblet cells, and may serve as a regulatory factor for intestinal mucosal lymphocytes. Knockout studies in mice suggested that this cytokine plays an essential role in lymphoid cell survival. Alternative splicing results in multiple transcript variants encoding distinct isoforms. Additional splice variants have been described but their presence in normal tissues has not been confirmed.[provided by RefSeq, Dec 2010]