Ankyrin Repeat Domain Protein 7 (ANKRD7)

Ankyrins are peripheral membrane proteins thought to interconnect integral proteins with the spectrin-based membrane skeleton. Erythrocytic ankyrin, also known as ankyrin-R (ANK1), and brain ankyrin, also known as ankyrin-B or ankyrin-2 (ANK2), are distinct forms.

Using differential mRNA display to identify testis-specific transcripts, Ozaki et al. (1996) cloned ANKRD7, which they called TSA806. The deduced 151-amino acid protein has a calculated molecular mass of 16.9 kD. ANKRD7 contains 3.3 copies of a 34-amino acid ankyrin repeat, followed by a short stretch of relatively hydrophobic sequence. Hartz (2007) mapped the ANKRD7 gene to chromosome 7q31.31 based on an alignment of the ANKRD7 sequence with the genomic sequence.