Crypteins - An Overlooked Piece of Peptide Systems

Crypteins, the hidden bioactive sequences, play an important role in the modulation of various biological processes, such as neuronal signaling, angiogenesis, immune response, inflammatory response and cell growth. Proteolytic mechanism leading to the release of crypteins possessing novel biological activities is an important factor for increasing diversity of functional molecules and represents a potential new source of peptide drugs. In this work we would like to focus on crypteins derived from the already known precursors and their potential therapeutic value.