This gene product belongs to the histone deacetylase family. Histone deacetylases act via the formation of large multiprotein complexes, and are responsible for the deacetylation of lysine residues at the N-terminal regions of core histones (H2A, H2B, H3 and H4). This protein forms transcriptional repressor complexes by associating with many different proteins, including YY1, a mammalian zinc-finger transcription factor. Thus, it plays an important role in transcriptional regulation, cell cycle progression and developmental events. Alternative splicing results in multiple transcript variants. [provided by RefSeq].