DiaPharma Group, Inc.

Cytokeratins are intermediate filament keratins found in the intracytoplasmic cytoskeleton of epithelial tissue. Low molecular weight cytokeratins, which are the acidic cytokeratins, comprise subtypes including CK18. Expression of various cytokeratins is frequently organ or tissue specific. Histopathologists employ such distinctions to detect the cell of origin of various tumors.

The subsets of cytokeratins which an epithelial cell expresses depends mainly on the type of epithelium, the moment in the course of terminal differentiation and the stage of development. Thus this specific cytokeratin fingerprint allows the classification of all epithelia upon their cytokeratin expression profile. The main research implication is that the study of the cytokeratin profile by immunohistochemistry techniques is a tool of immense value widely used for tumor determination.