Microfibrillar Associated Protein 2 (MFAP2)

Microfibrillar-associated protein 2 is a major antigen of elastin-associated microfibrils and a candidate for involvement in the etiology of inherited connective tissue diseases. This gene encodes two transcripts with two alternatively spliced 5' untranslated exons. These two transcripts contain the same 8 coding exons, and therefore, encode the same protein.

Chen et al. (1993) demonstrated that the mouse Magp transcript is a widespread product of mesenchymal/connective tissue cells throughout mouse development. A human MFAP2 cDNA was cloned by Faraco et al. (1995) from a human lung cDNA library using a human probe initially identified with primers from the bovine MFAP2 gene.