Apelin -13 is a vasoactive peptide and one of the most potent endogenous inotropic agents known. It is one of the active peptide fragments resulting from maturation of preproapelin. The apelin receptor is activated by the apelin family of peptides, which are hormones cleaved from the N-terminus of the 77-residue precursor hormone pre-pro apelin. It is suggested that Apelin-13 could be a competitive agonist to the apelin receptor, which is a class A G-protein coupled receptor and is a putative target for treatment of cardiovascular and metabolic diseases.
