Gregory Smutzer | Feb 17, 2002 | 9 min read
The ability of cells to degrade and rearrange extracellular matrix proteins is crucial for an organism's growth and development. Nearly 40 years ago, Jerome Gross and Charles Lapiere discovered that when tadpole tail fins resorb, their skin releases an enzyme that degrades native collagen triple helixes in the underlying support matrix.1 This enzyme, called collagenase, is present in a wide variety of vertebrates, invertebrates, and plants. Critical as it is, collagenase is just one member of a