Lectins in biological systems: applications to microbiology.

Carbohydrate binding proteins, lectins, are distributed widely in nature. These proteins, which occur as soluble or membrane associated molecules, have been isolated from plants, yeasts, mammals, birds, invertebrates, and bacteria. The plant lectins, which have been long known and are the best characterized, have provided important tools for the study of eucaryotic plasma membranes. Utilization of lectin affinity chromatography has yielded insights into the biochemical nature of the receptors for bacterial toxins. Plant lectins also have the potential to provide the means to investigate the possible role of cell-associated bacterial lectins in adherence of these prokaryotes to host tissues.