Khoo K H, Dell A
Institute of Biological Chemistry, Academia Sinica, Taipei, Taiwan.
Adv Exp Med Biol. 2001;491:185-205. doi: 10.1007/978-1-4615-1267-7_14.
We have provided an account of the progress we and others have made over the last decade on the structural characterization of glycans from parasitic helminths. We hope to have illustrated a few principles and patterns governing helminth glycosylation, as well as the experimental approaches adopted and their associated strengths and limitations. Schistosomes remain the best studied systems but are still punctuated with gaps of knowledge. An important theme developed here is the regulated developmental stage-specific expression of various glycan epitopes and their interplay with immediate host environments for successful parasitism. It is anticipated that more novel or unusual structures will continuously be uncovered in the future and that despite many difficulties, current analytical techniques should be well up to meet the challenge in at least elucidating the major or key glycoconjugates from each of the diverse range of worms. The bottle neck will in fact reside in finding suitable experimental models to test their putative immunobiological functions from which the intricate host-parasite interactions can be delineated and rational vaccine design be achieved. The glycobiology of parasitic helminths is an area waiting to be more fully explored and the rewards should be sweet.
我们已阐述了我们以及其他人在过去十年中对寄生蠕虫聚糖进行结构表征所取得的进展。我们希望已阐明了一些支配蠕虫糖基化的原理和模式，以及所采用的实验方法及其相关的优点和局限性。血吸虫仍然是研究最为深入的体系，但仍存在知识空白。本文所形成的一个重要主题是各种聚糖表位在发育阶段的特异性表达调控，以及它们与宿主直接环境相互作用以实现成功寄生。预计未来将不断发现更多新颖或不寻常的结构，并且尽管存在许多困难，但目前的分析技术至少应足以应对挑战，阐明来自各种不同蠕虫的主要或关键糖缀合物。事实上，瓶颈在于找到合适的实验模型来测试它们假定的免疫生物学功能，从而描绘出复杂的宿主 - 寄生虫相互作用并实现合理的疫苗设计。寄生蠕虫的糖生物学是一个有待更充分探索的领域，回报将会是丰厚的。
