Bone Morphogenetic Protein 7 is one of the BMPs, some of which belong to the TGF-beta superfamily (BMP2-7). There are more than thirteen BMPs have been discovered nowadays and they are involved in inducing cartilage and bone formation. BMP-7 is mainly expressed in kidney and bladder. It is also present in developing eyes, brain and ear during embryogenesis. BMP-7 also named osteogenic protein-1 (OP-1) is a potent osteoinductive cytokine and plays role in osteoblast differentiation, SMAD1 production and renal development and repair. Human BMP-7 is synthesized with a signal sequence (29 a.a.), a propeptide (263 a.a.), and a growth factor domain (139 a.a.). The growth factor domain of human BMP-7 shares 98 % a.a. sequence identity with mouse and rat BMP-7.
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