Figure 1.

Pentraxins at a glance. Major aspects of the biology of pentraxins are presented here that are further discussed in the main text. The short pentraxins CRP and SAP are mainly synthesized by the hepatocytes in response to IL-6 (systemic production), whereas PTX3 (prototypical long pentraxin) is locally made by a number of myeloid and stromal cells upon stimulation with pro-inflammatory cytokines and/or microbial moieties. All pentraxins share a family distinctive signature within the pentraxin (PTX) domain, and the long ones additionally contain an N-terminal region that is structurally unrelated to other proteins. In spite of diverse protein structure and gene regulation, these molecules have similar biological properties (summarized in the boxes), which highlights complexity and complementarity of this family of PRMs.