| Olfactory receptors interact with odorant molecules in the nose, to initiate a neuronal response that triggers the perception of a smell. The olfactory receptor proteins are members of a large family of G-protein-coupled receptors (GPCR) arising from single coding-exon genes. Olfactory receptors share a 7-transmembrane domain structure with many neurotransmitter and hormone receptors and are responsible for the recognition and G protein-mediated transduction of odorant signals. The olfactory receptor gene family is the largest in the genome. The nomenclature assigned to the olfactory receptor genes and proteins for this organism is independent of other organisms. Although originally considered to be a functional olfactory receptor, this family member is now considered to be pseudogene due to the presence of a C-terminal frameshift compared to other family members; this is also consistent with the Classifier for Olfactory Receptor Pseudogenes (CORP), as described in PMID:16939646. [provided by RefSeq, Jun 2011] |
