Rabbit Monoclonal Antibody to Caspase~3

This gene encodes a protein that belongs to a highly conserved family of cysteinyl aspartate~specific proteases that function as essential regulators of programmed cell death through apoptosis. Members of this family contain an N~terminal pro~domain and require cleavage at specific aspartate residues to become mature. The protein encoded by this gene belongs to a subgroup of cysteinyl aspartate~specific proteases that are activated by initiator caspases and that perform the proteolytic cleavage of apoptotic target proteins. Mice defective for this gene exhibit a variety of phenotypes including reduced neuronal apoptosis resulting in hyperplasias, hearing loss, attenuated osteogenic differentiation of bone marrow stromal stem cells, and pre~ and post~natal lethality. Alternative splicing results in multiple transcript variants. [provided by RefSeq, Sep 2015]