Scaffold protein ILK

ILK is a 452-amino acid scaffold protein that mediates protein-protein interactions essential for focal adhesion assembly, cell adhesion, and cell migration (UniProt: Q13418). It recruits PARVA and LIMS1 to form the IPP complex, which binds F-actin and promotes cytoskeleton reorganization. ILK also acts as an upstream effector of AKT1 and GSK3 signaling, regulates integrin-mediated signal transduction, and is required for mitotic spindle integrity.

ILK is expressed broadly across human tissues and functions primarily in integrin signaling and actin cytoskeleton dynamics. UniProt records no primary disease associations for this protein.

In Alzheimer's disease, ILK shows a disease-relevant upregulation in post-mortem AD brain compared to age-matched controls (Chaparral AD proteomics). The protein is elevated with a mean log₂ fold-change of 0.518 across the analyzed subcellular fractions from a TMT-labeled quantitative proteomics study. This upregulation may reflect altered cytoskeletal dynamics or integrin signaling in the AD brain, though functional consequences remain to be determined.