KIF3A
kinesin family member 3A
- Ensembl:
- ENSG00000131437
- UniProt:
- Q9Y496
- OMIM:
- 604683
- Synonyms:
- FLA10, KLP-20
Cilia effects upon perturbation of KIF3A
- Cilia number / % ciliated:
- Decreased cilia number
- Loss-of-function effect:
- Shorter cilia
- Overexpression effect:
- Unknown
Ciliogenesis screen results (6 screens)
- Kim2016: No effect
- Wheway et al. 2015 (siRNA) [siRNA]: No effect PMID:26167766
- Breslow et al. 2018 (CRISPR) [CRISPR]: Positive Regulator (Hh signaling, casTLE effect=-6.4) PMID:29459680
- Roosing et al. 2015 (siRNA) [siRNA]: No effect PMID:26595381
- Pusapati et al. 2018 (CRISPR) [CRISPR]: Positive Regulator (Hh signaling, neg_rank=814, lfc=-2.87) PMID:30270045
- Elliott et al. 2025 (CRISPRa) [CRISPRa]: Disassembly Trigger (casTLE Effect=-3.42) PMID:41160700
Ciliopathy associations
- Retinal Dystrophy/Degeneration
Subcellular localization
centrosome, cilia, cytosol, endosome, microtubules
Functional category
- Ciliary assembly/disassembly
- Trafficking (BBSome, small GTPases, vesicular transport, ATPases)
- Actin & cytoskeleton regulation
- Metabolism
- Signaling (Hedgehog, GPCRs, ion channels)
Function
Required for cilia assembly, function and organisation of subdistal appendiges of centrioles. Recruits p150Glued to the subdistal appendages of mother centrioles, critical for centrosomes to function as microtubule-organising centres and to recruit other subdistal appendage components such as Ninein and Cep170. Loss of Kif3a abrogates microtubule anchoring and ciliary basal foot formation (23386061).Conditional deletion of Kif3a resulted in the reduction of primary cilia number by 51% and length by 27% in osteoblasts(PMID: 22357948).
Model organism evidence
Interestingly, proteins of the photoreceptor primary cilium, such as NPHP4 and other ciliary proteins, including KIF3A, were shown to be localized to photoreceptor synaptic ribbons.
KEY POINTS: Macrophage accumulation in cystic kidney disease is not directly regulated by the cilia-dependent cyst activation pathway.