Macrophage colony-stimulating factor

Overview
Macrophage colony-stimulating factor, or M-CSF, is a secreted cytokine which influences hemopoietic stem cells to differentiate into macrophages or other related cell types. Eukaryotic cells also produce M-CSF in order to combat intercellular viral infection. (See colony-stimulating factor.) M-CSF binds to the macrophage colony-stimulating factor receptor. It may also be involved in development of the placenta.

Structure
It is a cytokine. The active form of the protein is found extracellularly as a disulfide-linked homodimer, and is thought to be produced by proteolytic cleavage of membrane-bound precursors.

Four transcript variants encoding three different isoforms have been found for this gene.