CTRP3 was first discovered in 2001 (43) in C3H10T1/2 mouse mesenchymal stem cells treated to induce chondrogenic differentiation. Because of its size and 23 Gly-X-Y repeats in the N-terminal collagen domain it was originally named CORS26 (Collagenous repeat-containing sequence 26 kDa protein). Later Wong et al. (2004) identified CTRP3 as a member of a family of highly conserved adiponectin paralogs designated as CTRPs and CORS26 was renamed CTRP3 (76). Alternative names that have been used for CTRP3 are cartducin (1, 44) and cartonectin (56, 73), both due to the detection of CTRP3 expression in developing cartilage.
