Clonal cell line ATDC5 enables the monitoring of the early- and late-phase chondrogenic differentiation in a single culture. Undifferentiated ATDC5 cells differentiate into type II collagen expressing chondrocytes through a cellular condensation stage (early-phase differentiation) and then to type X collagen-expressing hypertrophic chondrocytes (late-phase differentiation). Progression of cellu...

The number and function of intestinal intraepithelial lymphocytes (IELs) have been found to be significantly reduced following induction of acute intestinal mucosal damage via intestinal ischemia̸reperfusion (I̸R). However, the mechanism underlying this reduction remains unclear. Therefore, it was hypothesized that the interplay of bone morphogenetic protein (BMP)4 and interleukin (IL)‑7 regulate...

Heterotopic ossification occurring after the use of commercially available bone morphogenetic proteins has not been widely reported. We describe four cases of heterotopic ossification in patients treated with either recombinant bone morphogenetic protein 2 or recombinant bone morphogenetic protein 7. We found that while some patients were asymptomatic, heterotopic ossification which had occurre...

The central role of bone morphogenetic proteins (BMPs) in the remodelling process of the human skeleton has been identified in numerous experimental and clinical studies. BMPs appear to be key agents in the osteoblastic differentiation of mesenchymal stem cells, and more recent evidence implicates them with the cells of the osteoclastic lineage. BMP-2, BMP-4, BMP-6 and BMP-7 have been studied i...