Carbohydrate binding, quaternary structure and a novel hydrophobic binding site in two legume lectin oligomers from Dolichos biflorus

Carbohydrate/glycan-binding specificity of legume lectins in respect to their proposed biological functions

“…It should be take in account that some legume lectins have been shown to possess a hydrofobic cavity forming a combining site other than that to carbohydrate/glycan, which has a high affinity to adenine and some adeninerelated compounds, including plant hormones substances (Loris et al, 1998). In fact the legume Dolichos biflorus lectin has recently been successfully crystallized and its complex with adenine solved (Hamelryck et al, 1999). The capability to bind adenine was earlier showed (Gegg & Etzler, 1994;Puri & Surolia, 1994).…”

“…The PHA protein family seems to be a classical example of a integrated defense system which each protein has a precise role to protect seeds, although undefined yet. Structural studies of arcelin, PHA and α-amylase inhibitor have proved that these proteins share very similar three-dimensional folding but differing in quaternary structure and in their active binding site whose are ready distinct (Bompard-Gilles et al, 1996;Hamelryck et al, 1999;Mourey et al, 1998). Once, the activity and function do seem to be defined by the combine site-region.…”

“…At the present, a large number of lectins have been isolated and their biochemical characteristics established. Recently, an increasing number of three-dimensional structures of plant lectins have been solved from experimental analysis by x-ray diffraction (Bourne et al, 1990a;Hamelryck et al, 1999;Chandra et al, 1999) and others are in progress . Furthermore, the co-crystallization of some of these proteins with specific ligands has also given information towards the understanding of the interaction between lectins with simple and complex carbohydrates, revealing which amino acids residues are involved in the interaction between molecular partners.…”

Superchannel of Bacteria: Biological Significance and New Horizons

“…38) The overall structure of PA1167 is closely similar to that of A1-II 0 . 41) The -sandwich structure is observed in various sugar-related proteins such as 1,3-1,4--glucanase 42) and lectin, 43) suggesting that the structural features of the sugar-binding site are conserved among these proteins.…”

Isolation, characterization and production of a new recombinant lectin protein from leguminous plants

“…Plant lectins have great potential as tools in the identification, purification, and stimulation of specific glycoconjugates. They also have been widely used to distinguish between cell types [5,10]. Lectins are also found in microorganisms, plants and animals and have attracted great interest due to their varied physiological roles in cell agglutination [13], anti-tumour [15,16], immunomodulatory [22], antifungal [12] and antiviral effects [29].…”