Description
Genes that are constitutively and stably expressed at high levels in almost all tissues and cells are often referred to as housekeeping genes. Housekeeping proteins such as GAPDH, beta Actin, beta Tubulin, or Histone H2B (nuclear fractions) are useful as loading controls for western blots and protein normalization. Increasingly, researchers are making use of specific antibodies to housekeeping proteins to standardize and compare levels of protein. However, studies examining gene transcript and protein levels have shown that expression levels of housekeeping genes can vary. Collectively the results indicate that some housekeeping proteins may be better suited than others for use as loading controls depending on the model system used.
