Cotton Rat CXCL1/2/3/GRO Antibody

Cotton rat growth-regulated protein (GRO) is a member of the ELR⁺ CXC subfamily of chemokines (1). The cotton rat GRO cDNA encodes a 100 amino acid (aa) precursor protein with a 27 aa putative signal peptide and a 73 aa mature protein (2). Among the three human GRO proteins, mature cotton rat GRO is most closely related to CXCL1/GRO alpha, sharing approximately 77% aa sequence identity (3). It also shares 75% and 70% aa sequence identity with mature human CXCL2/GRO beta and CXCL3/GRO gamma, respectively (4). Compared with rat CXC chemokines, mature cotton rat shows 92%, 76%, and 76% aa sequence homology with rat KC/GRO/CINC-1, CINC-2, and CINC-3, respectively (5). Mature cotton rat CXCL1 also shares 74% sequence homology with mature cotton rat MIP-2 (6). Similarly to GRO proteins from other species, cotton rat CXCL1 is expected to be a potent neutrophil chemoattractant and activator. Cotton rat CXCL1 has been shown to bind and activate both mouse chemokine receptors CXCR1 and CXCR2 (7). Similarly to human CXCL1, the cotton rat CXCL1 concentration required to activate CXCR1 is at least an order of magnitude higher than that required to activate CXCR2 (7, 8). Based on studies on rodents, cotton rat CXCL1 is predicted to be produced by a wide variety of cell types including macrophages, endothelial cells, fibroblasts, astrocytes, neutrophils, keratinocytes, and intestinal epithelium (1, 9).