Cancer/Testis Antigen 2 (CTAG2)

CTAG2 encodes an autoimmunogenic tumor antigen that belongs to the ESO/LAGE family of cancer-testis antigens. This protein is expressed in a wide array of cancers including melanoma, breast cancer, bladder cancer and prostate cancer. This protein is also expressed in normal testis tissue. An alternative open reading frame product of this gene has been described in PMID 10399963. This alternate protein, termed CAMEL, is a tumor antigen that is recognized by melanoma-specific cytotoxic T-lymphocytes. Alternate splicing results in multiple transcript variants.One transcript predicts a 180-amino acid protein of 18.2 kD and the second is an unspliced variant that predicts a 210-amino acid protein of 21.1 kD. The third transcript, which they designated CAMEL, predicts a 109-amino acid protein with a molecular mass of 11.7 kD.