Manning Joachim C, Romero Antonio, Habermann Felix A, García Caballero Gabriel, Kaltner Herbert, Gabius Hans-Joachim
Institute of Physiological Chemistry, Ludwig-Maximilians-University Munich, 80539, Munich, Germany.
Chemical and Physical Biology, Centro de Investigaciones Biológicas, CSIC, 28040, Madrid, Spain.
Histochem Cell Biol. 2017 Feb;147(2):199-222. doi: 10.1007/s00418-016-1524-6. Epub 2016 Dec 24.
An experimental observation on selecting binding partners underlies the introduction of the term 'lectin'. Agglutination of erythrocytes depending on their blood-group status revealed the presence of activities in plant extracts that act in an epitope-specific manner like antibodies. As it turned out, their binding partners on the cell surface are carbohydrates of glycoconjugates. By definition, lectins are glycan-specific (mono- or oligosaccharides presented by glycoconjugates or polysaccharides) receptors, distinguished from antibodies, from enzymes using carbohydrates as substrates and from transporters of free saccharides. They are ubiquitous in Nature and structurally widely diversified. More than a dozen types of folding pattern have evolved for proteins that bind glycans. Used as tool, this capacity facilitates versatile mapping of glycan presence so that plant/fungal and also animal/human lectins have found a broad spectrum of biomedical applications. The functional pairing with physiological counterreceptors is involved in a wide range of cellular activities from cell adhesion, glycoconjugate trafficking to growth regulation and lets lectins act as sensors/effectors in host defense.
对选择结合伴侣的一项实验观察是“凝集素”这一术语引入的基础。红细胞根据其血型状态发生凝集，这揭示了植物提取物中存在以表位特异性方式起作用的活性物质，其作用方式类似于抗体。事实证明，它们在细胞表面的结合伴侣是糖缀合物的碳水化合物。根据定义，凝集素是聚糖特异性（由糖缀合物或多糖呈现的单糖或寡糖）受体，与抗体、以碳水化合物为底物的酶以及游离糖类转运体不同。它们在自然界中无处不在，结构上广泛多样。已经为结合聚糖的蛋白质进化出了十几种折叠模式。作为工具，这种能力有助于对聚糖的存在进行多功能映射，因此植物/真菌以及动物/人类凝集素都有广泛的生物医学应用。与生理反受体的功能配对涉及从细胞黏附、糖缀合物运输到生长调节等广泛的细胞活动，并使凝集素在宿主防御中充当传感器/效应器。
