Release 6.2

Albumin: the most popular entry in UniProtKB/Swiss-Prot

With 1'997 clicks in September 2005 from 702 different sites, albumin can be considered as the most popular protein in UniProtKB/Swiss-Prot. Albumin is also the most abundant plasma protein with 35-50 g/l (75% of protein molecules in plasma), a concentration superior by a factor of 10¹⁰ to that of cytokines, such as interleukin-6. This broad range of protein concentration in plasma makes identification of low abundance proteins quite a difficult task, as finding an individual human being by searching through the population of the entire world. Albumin is a multifunctional protein with ligand-binding and transport properties, antioxidant functions and enzymatic activities. Physiologically, it is responsible for maintaining colloid osmotic pressure and may influence microvascular integrity and aspects of the inflammatory pathway, including neutrophil adhesion and the activity of cell signaling moieties (for a review, see PubMed: 15915465).

In our "Hit Parade", albumin is followed by p53 (P04637) (1'862 clicks from 430 different sites), the EGF receptor (P00533) (1'414 clicks from 316 different sites) and insulin (P01308) (1'162 clicks from 361 different sites).

We are regularly analyzing our server access logs in order to determine annotation priorities. In particular, the most frequently requested entries from UniProtKB/TrEMBL are queued for manual annotation and "promotion" into UniProtKB/Swiss-Prot.