Epithelial Membrane Protein 1 (EMP1)

Ben-Porath and Benvenisty (1996) cloned a cDNA encoding epithelial membrane protein-1 (EMP1), named TMP by them, using RT-PCR on human embryo kidney RNA. Ruegg et al. (1996) independently isolated a cDNA encoding EMP1, termed B4B by them, using differential display PCR. The predicted 157-amino acid EMP1 protein contains 4 transmembrane domains and 2 potential N-linked glycosylation sites in the first extracellular loop.Chen et al. (1997) found that the EMP1 gene contains 5 exons and 4 introns, and they noted that the exon/intron junctions are located at the same positions as those of PMP22, suggesting that EMP1 and PMP22 arose by duplication of a common ancestral gene.