Twenty Years of Investigating Angiotensin Activity: An Overview

A short account of the renin-angiotensin-aldosterone system is given with emphasis on the relationship between the octapeptide angiotensin II and its decapeptide precursor angiotensin I. Although the decapeptide is generally assumed to have no biological activity, extensive investigations have indicated that such an assumption is almost certainly unjustified. The implications of the findings are briefly outlined and discussed.