Kinesin Family, Member 12 (KIF12)

KIF12 is a member of the kinesin superfamily of microtubule-associated molecular motors that play important roles in intracellular transport and cell division.By PCR screening of 4-week-old mouse kidney cDNAs with degenerate kinesin superfamily sequence primers as probe, Nakagawa et al. (1997) cloned mouse Kif12. By database analysis using mouse Kif12 as probe, Katoh and Katoh (2005) assembled full-length human KIF12. The deduced 651-amino acid protein contains a kinesin motor catalytic domain, a coiled-coil domain with internal hinge region, and a C-terminal tail domain. KIF12 shares 80.8% amino acid sequence identity with its mouse homolog. EST database analysis identified KIF12 expression in fetal liver, adult brain, and pancreatic islet, as well as kidney tumors, uterine cancer, and pancreatic cancer.