Bone morphogenetic proteins（BMPs） have been shown to be multifunctional cytokines with a wide range of biological activities on various cell types. Smads proteins transduce BMPs intercellular signals into the nucleus and regulate transcription of target genes. In the nucleus, various Smad- binding proteins interact with the transcription complex, which may play critical roles in regulating the transcription of BMPs- related genes. In this review, we emphasis on the BMPs- Smad pathway and Smad binding proteins including transcription factors, transcriptional co- activators and co- repressors.
