Oink! — Glycan receptors for flu viruses

Pigs are natural hosts for influenza viruses that can infect humans, in particular the 2009 and, going way back, 1918 H1N1 flu strains. So to understand how influenza infections spread in the body, biochemists and virologists look at pigs.

Biochemistry chair Rick Cummings’ group has a paper in PNAS this week examining the carbohydrates or glycans on the surfaces of pig lung cells, using their “shotgun glycomics” library approach. MMG graduate student Lauren Byrd-Leotis is the first author.Piglung

“The results illustrate the repertoire of specific, endogenous N-glycans of pig lung glycoproteins for virus recognition and offer a new direction for studying endogenous glycan functions in viral pathogenesis,” the team reports.

Posted on by Quinn Eastman in Immunology Leave a comment

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Quinn Eastman

Science Writer, Research Communications qeastma@emory.edu 404-727-7829 Office

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