Neural Cell Adhesion Molecule 2 (NCAM2)

Paoloni-Giacobino et al. (1997) performed exon trapping from chromosome 21-specific cosmids. They identified a novel trapped exon that showed homology to NCAM1. They cloned the corresponding cDNA from a human fetal brain cDNA library and reported that it encodes an 837-amino acid polypeptide containing 5 immunoglobulin-like domains, 2 fibronectin type III domains, and 1 predicted transmembrane domain. The overall size and structure of the predicted protein are similar to the shorter isoform of NCAM1. The authors were unable to identify any longer cDNAs. Paoloni-Giacobino et al. (1997) showed by Northern blot analysis that the NCAM2 gene is expressed as mRNAs of 9.5 and 4.4 kb in fetal and adult brain; they observed these and other transcript sizes at lower levels in several other tissues.