The monoclonal antibody mAb.A2B5 is a marker for the detection of oligodendrocyte progenitor cells that differentiate into type-2 astrocytes and oligodendrocytes. It is also a useful antibody for separating these cells from other lineage populations. The epitope of this antibody is considered to be the gangliosides GT3 and GQ1c. In this study, we sought to define more precisely the structure of...

Mucus glycoproteins from newborn and adult rat small intestine were radiolabelled in vivo with Na2 35SO4 and isolated from mucosal homogenates by using Sepharose 4B column chromatography followed by CsCl-density-gradient centrifugation. Non-covalently bound proteins, lipids and nucleic acids were not detected in the purified glycoproteins. Amino acid, carbohydrate and sulphate compositions were...

The insertion of axonally transported fucosyl glycoproteins into the axolemma of regenerating nerve sprouts was examined in rat sciatic motor axons at intervals after nerve crush. [(3)H]Fucose was injected into the lumbar ventral horns and the nerves were removed at intervals between 1 and 14 d after labeling. To follow the fate of the "pulse- labeled" glycoproteins, we examined the nerves by c...

Innate immune recognition is an important early event in the host response to herpes simplex virus-1 (HSV-1) infection. Dendritic cells (DC) play an important sentinel role in this recognition. Previous studies have shown that monocyte-derived DC (MDDC) respond to HSV-1 by up-regulation of costimulatory molecules and type I IFN release, but the molecular targets on the virus recognized by the D...

Human blood group A, B, H, Ii, Le(a) and Le(b) antigens and their determinants expressed on ovarian cyst glycoproteins have been studied for over five decades. However, little is known about sialyl Le(x) and sialyl Le(a) glycotopes, which play essential roles in normal immunity, inflammation, and cancer cell metastasis. Furthermore, Le(x) and Le(y) were classified as glycotopes of unknown genes...

Glycoproteins are closely associated with the occurrence of diverse diseases, and they have been used as biomarkers and therapeutic targets in clinical diagnostics. Currently, mass spectrometry has proven to be a powerful tool for glycoprotein analysis, but it is almost impossible to directly identify glycoproteins without the preparation and pretreatment of samples. Furthermore, biological sam...

Mucins are high molecular weight glycoproteins which are heavily glycosylated with many carbohydrate side chains. In epithelial cancers such as biliopancreatic cancer, both quantitative and qualitative alterations in carbohydrate and polypeptide moieties of mucin glycoproteins occur. These changes in mucin glycoproteins are one of the most common phenotypic markers of biliopancreatic carcinogen...

Sindbis virus-infected baby hamster kidney (BHK) cells were analyzed by thin section fracture-label. Specific immunolabel with antiviral glycoprotein antibodies was used in conjunction with colloidal gold-conjugated protein A. As we previously reported (Torrisi, M. R., and S. Bonatti, 1985, J. Cell Biol., 101:1300-1306), Sindbis transmembrane glycoproteins are present in the inner nuclear membr...

Mammalian P-glycoproteins are plasma membrane proteins belonging to the superfamily of ATP-binding cassette transporters. They were discovered as drug pumps in multidrug-resistant cancer cells, but are also present in many normal tissues. Genetic approaches have helped to dissect the physiological functions and mode of action of P-glycoproteins. Disruption of both genes for the drug-transportin...

This chapter focuses on the biological roles of the glycans contained in glycoproteins. Today we know there is no unifYing function for the carbohydrates present in glycoproteins. They rather span the complete spectrum from being obviously unimportant to being crucial for the survival of an organism. In a crude scheme, their biological functions can be classif ed into two groups. On one hand, t...