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.[provided by RefSeq, Jun 2009]