Signal Peptide Peptidase Like 2A (SPPL2A)

SPPL2A is a member of the signal peptide peptidase-like protease (SPPL) family and encodes an endosomal membrane protein with a protease associated (PA) domain. This protein plays a role in innate and adaptive immunity. A pseudogene of this gene also lies on chromosome 15.By searching sequence databases for homologs of Dictyostelium discoideum Impas, which shares homology with presenilin, followed by PCR of lymphocyte and hippocampus cDNA libraries, Grigorenko et al. (2002) cloned IMP3. The deduced protein contains 520 amino acids. Like other IMP proteins, IMP3 contains an N-terminal protease-associated (PA) domain, several transmembrane regions, a hydrophilic loop, conservative sequences around the first and second aspartate residues, and an invariant PAL motif near the C terminus.