Recombinant Viral Macrophage Inflammatory Protein-2 (rvMIP-2)

Viral MIP-2 cDNA encodes a 94 amino acid residue precursor protein with a 23 aa residue signal peptide that is cleaved to yield a 71 aa residue mature protein. Among human chemokines, vMIP-2 is most closely related to MIP-1α, sharing approximately 41% amino acid sequence identity. At the amino acid sequence level, vMIP-1 and vMIP-2 also share 48% identity. vMIP-1 and vMIP-2 are more closely related to one another phylogenetically than to other human chemokines, suggesting that they may have arisen by gene duplication within the virus rather than by two independent gene aquisitions. vMIP-2 binds to the CCR3 chemokine receptor through which eotaxin and other β chemokines activate eosinophils. vMIP-2 has been shown to activate and chemoattract human eosinphils.