Keratins are intermediate filament proteins responsible
for the structural integrity of epithelial cells. The type II
keratins consist of basic or neutral proteins which are arranged in
pairs of heterotypic keratin chains coexpressed during
differentiation of simple and stratified epithelial tissues. This
gene encodes a type II keratin that is specifically expressed in
the inner root sheath of hair follicles. The type II keratins are
clustered in a region of chromosome 12q12-q13. Multiple transcript
variants encoding different isoforms have been found for this gene.
