Meis Homeobox Protein 3 (MEIS3)

MEIS3 appears to be a retrotransposed pseudogene based on its lack of exons compared to other family members, one of which is found on chromosome 19 (MEIS3). It does appear to be transcribed and has an ORF that may encode a protein of similar size and sequence to that encoded by MEIS3. Sequence analysis revealed extensive amino acid similarity among the three Meis proteins both within and outside of the homeodomain. Phylogenetic analysis showed that the Meis genes belong to a distinct family of Pbx-related genes. Chromosome mapping studies indicated that Meis2 and Meis3 are unlinked to Meis1 and map to mouse chromosome 2 and 7, respectively. The Meis genes displayed distinct but overlapping patterns of expression in normal tissues and were expressed in some cases of murine myeloid leukemia.