Nucleic acid molecules encoding a transmembrane serine protease 25, the encoded polypeptides and methods based thereon

A substantially purified polypeptide selected from the group consisting of:

• a) a single chain polypeptide that consists essentially of sequence of amino acids set forth as residues 1-237 in SEQ ID No. 6, residues 78-323 in SEQ ID No. 16 or catalytically active portions thereof;
• and optionally additional sequences of amino acids from other than an MTSP25 polypeptide;
• b) an activated two chain polypeptide that comprises the sequence of amino acids set forth as residues 1-237 in SEQ ID No. 6 or the sequence of amino acids set forth as residues 17-313 or residues 78-313 in SEQ ID No. 16 or catalytically active portions thereof;
• c) an activated two chain or single chain polypeptide that consists essentially of residues 17-237 or 1-237 of SEQ ID No. 6 or residues 78-323 or C-terminal truncated variants thereof in SEQ ID No. 16 or residues 17-323 of SEQ ID No. 16, or catalytically active portions of any of these polypeptides;
• and optionally additional sequences of amino acids from other than an MTPS25 polypeptide;
• d) an activated two chain polypeptide that comprises the sequence of amino acids set forth as residues 64-191 of SEQ ID No. 16 or catalytically active portions thereof;
• e) a polypeptide that includes a sequence of amino acids having at least about 60%, 70%, 75%, 80%, 81%, 82%, 83%, 84%, 85%, 86%, 87%, 88%, 89%, 90%, 91%, 92%, 93%, 94%, 95%, 96%, 97%, 98% or 99% sequence identity with the sequence of amino acids of the MTSP25 portion of any of the polypeptides of a)-d);
• f) a protease domain of a polypeptide encoded by a splice variant of a sequence of nucleotides that encodes an MTSP25 of any of a)-e);
• and g) a polypeptide encoded by a sequence of nucleotides that hybridizes under conditions of low, moderate or high stringency to the sequence of nucleotides encoding the MTPS25 portion of the polypeptides of any of a)-f) where the sequence of nucleotides hybridizes along at least about 70%, 80% or 90% of its full-length under such conditions.