Aminoacyl-tRNA synthetases catalyze the aminoacylation of tRNA by their cognate amino acid. Because of their central role in linking amino acids with nucleotide triplets contained in tRNAS, aminoacyl-tRNA synthetases are thought to be among the first proteins that appeared in evolution. Isoleucine-tRNA synthetase belongs to the class-I aminoacyl-tRNA synthetase family and has been identified as a target of autoantibodies in the autoimmune disease polymyositis/dermatomyositis. Alternatively spliced transcript variants have been found. [provided by RefSeq, Nov 2012].