Innate immune Galectin-7 specifically targets microbes that decorate themselves in blood-like

• Type of Material: Article
• Authors: Shang-Chuen Wu, Harvard Medical School; Nourine A Kamili, Harvard Medical School; Marcelo Dias-Baruffi, Univ Sao Paulo; Cassandra Josephson, Emory University; Matthew F Rathgeber, Harvard Medical School; Melissa Y Yeung, Harvard Medical School; William J Lane, Harvard Medical School; Jianmei Wang, Emory University; Hau-Ming Jan, Harvard Medical School; Seth Rakoff-Nahoum, Harvard Medical School; Richard Cummings, Emory University; Sean Stowell, Emory University; Connie M Arthur, Harvard Medical School
• Language: English
• Date: 2022-07-15
• Publisher: CELL PRESS
• Publication Version: Final Published Version
• Copyright Statement: © 2022 The Author(s)
• License: Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 4.0 International
• Final Published Version (URL): http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.isci.2022.104482
• Title of Journal or Parent Work: ISCIENCE
• Volume: 25
• Issue: 7
• Start Page: 104482
• End Page: 104482
• Grant/Funding Information: This work was supported by grants from the US National Institutes of Health to R.D.C. (HL085607 and R24 GM137763) and by resources from the Consortium for Functional Glycomics (Core D and Core H), funded by the US National Institute of General Medical Sciences/U.S. National Institutes of Health (GM62116) and the Burroughs Wellcome Trust Career Award for Medical Scientists, the National Institutes of Health Early Independence grant DP5OD019892, and U01 CA242109 to SRS.
• Keywords: MOLECULAR MIMICRY; GENE-CLUSTER; Science & Technology; Multidisciplinary Sciences; LECTIN MICROARRAY; N-ACETYLLACTOSAMINE; AFFINITY; PROFILES; TRANSFERASE; Science & Technology - Other Topics; RECOGNITION; INFECTION; ANTIMICROBIAL PEPTIDES
• Research Categories: Health Sciences, Medicine and Surgery

Abstract

Adaptive immunity can target a nearly infinite range of antigens, yet it is tempered by tolerogenic mechanisms that limit autoimmunity. Such immunological tolerance, however, creates a gap in adaptive immunity against microbes decorated with self-like antigens as a form of molecular mimicry. Our results demonstrate that the innate immune lectin galectin-7 (Gal-7) binds a variety of distinct microbes, all of which share features of blood group-like antigens. Gal-7 binding to each blood group expressing microbe, including strains of Escherichia coli, Klebsiella pneumoniae, Providencia alcalifaciens, and Streptococcus pneumoniae, results in loss of microbial viability. Although Gal-7 also binds red blood cells (RBCs), this interaction does not alter RBC membrane integrity. These results demonstrate that Gal-7 recognizes a diverse range of microbes, each of which use molecular mimicry while failing to induce host cell injury, and thus may provide an innate form of immunity against molecular mimicry.