Soluble defense collagens including the collectins play important roles in innate immunity. Recently, a new member of the collectin family named collectin-12 (CL-12 or CL-P1) has been identified. CL-12 is highly expressed in umbilical cord vascular endothelial cells as a transmembrane receptor and may recognize certain bacteria and fungi, leading to opsonophagocytosis. However, based on its structural and functional similarities with soluble collectins, we hypothesized the existence of a fluid-phase analog of CL-12 released from cells, which may function as a soluble pattern-recognition molecule. Using recombinant CL-12 full length or CL-12 extracellular domain, we determined the occurrence of soluble CL-12 shed from in vitro cultured cells. Western blot showed that soluble recombinant CL-12 migrated with a band corresponding to ∼120 kDa under reducing conditions, whereas under nonreducing conditions it presented multimeric assembly forms. Immunoprecipitation and Western blot analysis of human umbilical cord plasma enabled identification of a natural soluble form of CL-12 having an electrophoretic mobility pattern close to that of shed soluble recombinant CL-12. Soluble CL-12 could recognize Aspergillus fumigatus partially through the carbohydrate-recognition domain in a Ca2+-independent manner. This led to activation of the alternative pathway of complement exclusively via association with properdin on A. fumigatus as validated by detection of C3b deposition and formation of the terminal complement complex. These results demonstrate the existence of CL-12 in a soluble form and indicate a novel mechanism by which the alternative pathway of complement may be triggered directly by a soluble pattern-recognition molecule.

The recognition molecules of the lectin complement pathway are mannose-binding lectin and Ficolin -1, -2 and -3. Recently deficiency of Ficolin-3 was found to be associated with life threatening infections. Thus, we aimed to develop a functional method based on the ELISA platform for evaluating Ficolin-3 mediated complement activation that could be applicable for research and clinical use. Bovine serum albumin (BSA) was acetylated (acBSA) and chosen as a solid phase ligand for Ficolins in microtiter wells. Binding of Ficolins on acBSA was evaluated, as was functional complement activation assessed by C4, C3 and terminal complement complex (TCC) deposition. Serum Ficolin-3 bound to acBSA in a calcium dependent manner, while only minimal binding of Ficolin-2 and no binding of Ficolin-1 were observed. No binding to normal BSA was seen for any of the Ficolins. Serum C4, C3 and TCC deposition on acBSA were dependent only on Ficolin-3 in appropriate serum dilutions. Deposition of down stream complement components correlated highly significantly with the serum concentration of Ficolin-3 but not with Ficolin-2 in healthy donors. To make the assay robust for clinical use a chemical compound was applied to the samples that inhibited interference from the classical pathway due to the presence of anti-BSA antibodies in some sera. We describe a novel functional method for measuring complement activation mediated by Ficolin-3 in human serum up to the formation of TCC. The assay provides the possibility to diagnose functional and genetic defects of Ficolin-3 and down stream components in the lectin complement pathway.

Our data provide evidence that LCP is activated after SAH and that the actual plasma concentrations of ficolin-3 reflect the severity of brain injury as evaluated by clinical and structural parameters. These results support the idea that ficolin-3-mediated functional LCP activity may be targeted to control injury progression in SAH.