Sjogren syndrome antigen B(SSB) Homo sapiens The protein encoded by this gene is involved in diverse aspects of RNA metabolism, including binding and protecting poly(U) termini of nascent RNA polymerase III transcripts from exonuclease digestion, processing 5' and 3' ends of pre-tRNA precursors, acting as an RNA chaperone, and binding viral RNAs associated with hepatitis C virus. Autoantibodies reacting with this protein are found in the sera of patients with Sjogren syndrome and systemic lupus erythematosus. Alternative promoter usage results in two different transcript variants which encode the same protein. [provided by RefSeq, Jun 2014]