Fibroblast Growth Factor-8 (FGF-8) is a heparin-binding growth factor of the FGF family. There are 4 known forms of FGF8 produced by alternative splicing: FGF8a, FGF-8b, FGF-8e and FGF-8f. The human and mouse FGF8b are identical of aa sequences. FGF-8 plays an important role in the regulation of embryonic development, cell proliferation, cell differentiation and cell migration. FGF-8 is required for normal brain, eye, ear and limb development during embryogenesis. It is also required for normal development of the gonadotropin- releasing hormone (GnRH) neuronal system.
Recombinant human Fibroblast Growth Factor-8 (rhFGF-8) produced in E. coli is a single non-glycosylated polypeptide chain containing 194 amino acids. A fully biologically active molecule, rhFGF-8 has a molecular mass of 22.5kDa analyzed by reducing SDS-PAGE and is obtained by proprietary chromatographic techniques at GenScript.