This gene product mediates the attachment of erythroblasts to macrophages. This attachment promotes terminal maturation and enucleation of erythroblasts, presumably by suppressing apoptosis. This protein is an integral membrane protein with the N-terminus on the extracellular side and the C-terminus on the cytoplasmic side of the cell. Two immunologically related isoforms of erythroblast macrophage protein with apparent molecular weights of 33 kD and 36 kD were detected in macrophage membranes; this gene encodes the larger isoform. Multiple alternatively spliced transcript variants encoding distinct isoforms have been found for this gene, but the biological validity of some variants has not been determined.