Chemical evidence for common genetic ancestry of complement components C3 and C5.

Expression and characterization of the C345C/NTR domains of complement components C3 and C5.

Complement components C3, C4, and C5 are members of the thioester-containing alpha-macroglobulin protein superfamily. Within this superfamily, a unique feature of the complement proteins is a 150-residue-long C-terminal extension of their alpha-subunits that harbors three internal disulfide bonds. Previous reports have suggested that this is an independent structural module, homologous to modul...

Complement C3 and C5 Deficiency Affects Fracture Healing

There is increasing evidence that complement may play a role in bone development. Our previous studies demonstrated that the key complement receptor C5aR was strongly expressed in the fracture callus not only by immune cells but also by bone cells and chondroblasts, indicating a function in bone repair. To further elucidate the role of complement in bone healing, this study investigated fractur...

Factors C3 and C5 Human Skin Mast Cells Express Complement

Active sites in complement components C5 and C3 identified by proximity to indels in the C3/4/5 protein family.

We recently suggested that sites of length polymorphisms in protein families (indels) might serve as useful guides for locating protein:protein interaction sites. This report describes additional site-specific mutagenesis and synthetic peptide inhibition studies aimed at testing this idea for the paralogous complement C3, C4, and C5 proteins. A series of C5 mutants was constructed by altering t...

Phylogeny of the C3/C4/C5 complement-component gene family indicates that C5 diverged first.

A phylogenetic analysis of DNA sequences from the C3/C4/C5 complement-component family of vertebrates supported the hypothesis that the C5 gene diverged first from the common ancestor of C3 and C4 and that C3 and C4 diverged later. The close relationship of C3 and C4 was further supported by the fact that a hagfish complement-component gene showed evidence of being more closely related to both ...