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The Acute Phase Protein Haptoglobin Is A Mammalian Extracellular Chaperone With An Action Similar To Clusterin, Justin Yerbury, Mark S Rybchyn, Simon B Easterbrook-Smith, C. Henriques, Mark Wilson

Mark R Wilson

Haptoglobin (Hp) is an acidic glycoprotein present in most body fluids of humans and other mammals. Although the functions of Hp are not yet fully understood, the available evidence indicates that it is likely to play an important role in suppressing inflammatory responses. Some earlier work suggested that Hp might be a newly identified member of a small group of extracellular chaperones found at significant levels in human body fluids. Previously, the only well-characterized member of this group was clusterin, which shares functional similarities with the small heat-shock proteins. We report here that Hp specifically inhibited the precipitation of a …