70 INTRODUCTION TO IMMUNOCHEMICAL SPECIFICITY 



Another example of the practical use of lectins was discovered by 

 Levine, Celano, Lange, and Berliner (1957). Using the anti-N of 

 Vicia graminea, they observed that horse erythrocytes contain the 

 N antigen, a fact that absorbed rabbit sera had failed to reveal because 

 species-specific agglutinins had remained in the absorbed sera. The 

 finding of N in the erythrocytes of the horse led Levine and his 

 colleagues to look for natural anti-M in horse serum. Having found 

 it, they were led to predict that the horse should be a good producer 

 of immune anti-M. This prediction was verified, and thus a new and 

 abundant source of immune anti-M was discovered. 



Until recently all plant agglutinins tested fell into two categories : 

 either they agglutinated the red cells of all human beings and were 

 thus considered of little interest because they were "nonspecific," or 

 they reacted with one of the already known agglutinogens of human 

 blood. (It is a striking fact that in spite of the thousands of species 

 of plants already tested, no lectin reacting specifically with any of 

 the Rh antigens has been found. I shall suggest a possible explana- 

 tion for this in Chapter 7.) Recently, Boyd et al. (1959) found in 

 extracts of ordinary peanuts (AracJiis hypogaea) an agglutinin which 

 seems to be an exception to this rule. It agglutinates some human 

 erythrocytes and does not agglutinate others. But the agglutinogen 

 detected, if a distinct agglutinogen is involved, seems to be different 

 from A, B, H, M, N, P, S, s, C, D, E, c, e, V, Fy^ Fy^ K, k, 

 Le^, Le", Lu"*, Lu*", Jk", Jk'', or Js. Unfortunately the new agglutinin is 

 very weak and works only with erythrocytes suspended in serum 

 albumin. 



References 



Atwood, K. C, and S. L. Scheinberg, 1958, /. Cellular Comt^. Physiol. 52, 



Suppl. 1, 97. 

 Bird, G. W. G., 1951, Current Sei. (India) 20, 298. 

 Bird, G. W. G., 1959, Brit. Med. Bull. 15, 165. 

 Boyd, W. C, D. L. Everhart, and M. H. McMaster, 1958, /. Immunol. 81, 



414. 

 Boyd, W. C, D. M. Green, D. M. Fujinaga, J. S. Drabik, and E. Waszczenko- 



Zacharczenko, 1959, ['o.r Sanguinis 4, 456. 

 Boyd, W. C, and R. M. Reguera, 1949, /. Immunol. 62, 22,i. 

 Boyd, W. C, and E. Shapleigh, 1954a, /. Immunol. 73, 226. 

 Boyd, W. C, and E. Shapleigh, 1954b, Blood 9, 1195. 



