Bone Morphogenetic Proteins: Regeneration of Bone and Beyond

There is a great interest for biological regeneration of tissues in particular by using growth factors. BMPs are at this time the only growth and differentiation factors discovered with a high potential in inducing regeneration of tissues like bone, cartilage, kidney, brain etc. Other indications for BMPs in clinical medicine have been further explored in laboratories worldwide, including new discoveries in the field of nephrology and oncology (e.g. in renal osteodystrophy, prostate cancer in animals and metastatic breast cancer). In the field of structur/function analysis of BMPs new discoveries have been made improving our understanding of interactions with receptors and antagonists which could become important in designing drugs for preventing and curing diseases like fibrodysplasia ossificans progressiva.Covering these points the volume will be of interest to both clinicians and basic scientists, in particular to those entering this exciting field.