Osteoporosis is a common problem of aging and results from a failure of homeostatic
mechanisms to regulate osteogenesis and mineralization. Bovine and human forms of fetuin
glycoprotein bind to the transforming growth factor (TGF)-β/BMP (bone morphogenic protein)
cytokines and block their osteogenic activity in cell culture assays (Demetriou, M., Binkert,
C., Sukhu, B., Tenenbaum, HC, and Dennis, JW (1996) J. Biol. Chem. 271, 12755–12761).
Fetuin is a prominent serum glycoprotein and a major noncollagenous component of …