Studies of lectin binding to normal and neoplastic lymphoid tissues. I. Normal nodes and Hodgkin's disease.

Lectins are proteins which have the ability to interact specifically with carbohydrate residues of glycoproteins and other glycoconjugates. The staining patterns of 10 fluorescein conjugated lectins (F-Con A, F-LCA, F-RCA, F-WGA, F-PHA, F-PWM, F-LTA, F-SBA, F-PNA, F-DB) and a protease inhibitor (F-LA) have been studied in histological sections of 11 normal or reactive lymph nodes and 6 nodes and one skin biopsy involved by Hodgkin's disease. On the basis of the patterns of lectin binding, and current knowledge of their saccharide specificities, we found that within germinal centres there is an orderly carbohydrate rich extracellular matrix which contains a higher concentration of GlcNAc and terminal Gal residues than the surface membranes of component cells. This suggests active secretion rather than simple membrane shedding, and it is possible that this pericellular domain plays a part in the regulation of the proliferative response, or controls migration of lymphocytes in and out of the germinal centre. Lectin binding in Reed-Sternberg cells suggests that the huge nucleoli contain glycoconjugates of diverse structure, which may be linked with their failure to undergo cytokinesis.