Chemerin peptide

Chemerin peptides are short peptides (on the order of 9 amino acids) that are produced from the carboxyl terminus of the chemokine chemerin. Chemerin is an chemotactic adipokine; essentially a signalling protein that is involved in adipogenesis and immune response.^[1] Chemerin peptides display the same activities as chemerin, although at higher efficacy and potency.^[2]

retinoic acid receptor responder (tazarotene induced) 2
Identifiers
Symbol	RARRES2
Alt. symbols	chemerin
NCBI gene	5919
HGNC	9868
OMIM	601973
RefSeq	NM_002889
UniProt	Q99969
Other data
Locus	Chr. 7 q36.1
Search for Structures Swiss-model Domains InterPro

Chemerin-derived peptides

A particular synthetic chemerin-derived peptide, termed C15, was developed at Oxford University. It showed anti-inflammatory activities. Intraperitoneal administration of C15 (0.32 ng/kg) to mice before zymosan challenge conferred significant protection against zymosan-induced peritonitis, suppressing neutrophil (63%) and monocyte (62%) recruitment with a concomitant reduction in proinflammatory mediator expression.^[3]

C15 was found to promote phagocytosis and efferocytosis in peritoneal macrophages at picomolar concentrations. C15 enhanced macrophage clearance of microbial particles and apoptotic cells by factor of 360% in vitro. ^[4]

Another chemerin-derived peptide, termed C-20, was developed at the Shenzhen Institute of Advanced Technology. Administration C-20 uncovered its high affinity binding to chemerin receptors CMKLR1 and GPR1, mimicking chemerin’s activity but with lower potency. C-20 triggered receptor internalization, promoted chemotaxis, and mildly suppressed hormone production (testosterone and progesterone), suggesting its potential as a tool to study chemerin-related signaling pathways.^[5]