Classification and comparison of fucose-binding lectins based on their structures

Abstract

Fucose-binding lectins play important roles in many biological processes including cell adhesion, infection of host cells by pathogenic bacteria, and binding to glycosylated proteins. Many three-dimensional structures of fucose-binding lectins have been reported. We compiled and compared the fucose-binding lectins whose structures have been solved to date. With the exception of three lone proteins, these lectins can be classified into six families. In this review, we describe the various fucose-binding mechanism of lectins based on their three-dimensional structures.