Nuclear Receptor Coactivator 4 (NCOA4), also known as ARA70 or ELE1, was initially discovered as a transcriptional coactivator of androgen receptor. NCOA4 has also been implicated in regulation of peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor gamma and alpha, as well as estrogen receptor alpha. NCOA4 plays an autophagic role as a cargo receptor by shuttling ferritin to the lysosome in order to maintain iron homeostasis, which ultimately controls heme synthesis and red blood cell development. The NCOA4 gene has been shown to undergo a fusion event with the RET proto-oncogene, forming RET/PTC3 in thyroid and other types of cancers .
