Vimentin

Vimentin (VIM ) is a type 3 intermediate filament from the group of desmins and thus an element of the cytoskeleton of vertebrates. The molecular mass of human vimentin is 53 689 daltons. It comes in the cytoplasm (partly also in the nucleolus ) of all cells of mesenchymal origin (eg, fibroblasts, endothelial cells, smooth muscle cells) before.

Little is known about the exact function of vimentin. Knock-out mice lacking the gene was removed to produce vimentin showed for example in muscle development without phenotypic changes. However, in adult animals, a number of abnormalities of the muscle cells were observed, such as misaligned muscle fibers.

In pathology, vimentin is used as a general marker for soft tissue tumors.

Human Genome Organisation Mesenchyme Endothelium Smooth muscle tissue Gene knockout
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