The ITGA6 protein product is the integrin alpha chain alpha 6. Integrins are integral cell-surface proteins composed of an alpha chain and a beta chain. A given chain may combine with multiple partners resulting in different integrins. For example, alpha 6 may combine with beta 4 in the integrin referred to as TSP180, or with beta 1 in the integrin VLA-6. Integrins are known to participate in cell adhesion as well as cell-surface mediated signalling.

The alpha-6 subunit encoded by this cDNA consists of 1,050 amino acids with a 991-amino acid extracellular domain, a 23-amino acid transmembrane domain, and a 36-amino acid cytoplasmic domain. The alpha-6 subunit most closely resembles the alpha-3 subunit, which shows 40% identity.