Faculty Opinions recommendation of A rapid and sensitive bioassay to measure bone morphogenetic protein activity.

Background: Bone morphogenetic proteins (BMPs) are members of the TGF-beta superfamily and were originally identified as proteins that induce ectopic bone formation. BMPs were shown subsequently to be involved in several biological processes during development and in adult tissues through the regulation of the growth, differentiation and apoptosis of various cell types. An alkaline phosphatase (ALP)-based assay is the most widely used assay to evaluate BMP activity. However, the ALP assay is not rapid and not sensitive enough to measure BMP activity at physiological concentrations. In this paper, we describe a highly sensitive, rapid, and specific cell-based assay for the quantification of BMP activity.