Monovalent interactions of galectin-1.

Galectin-1, a ß-galactoside binding lectin involved in immunoregulation and cancer, binds natural and many synthetic multivalent glycoconjugates with an apparent glycoside cluster effect, that is, affinity above and beyond what would be expected from the concentration of the determinant sugar. Here we have analyzed the mechanism of such cluster effects in solution at physiological concentration using a fluorescence anisotropy assay with a novel fluorescent high-affinity galectin-1 binding probe. The interaction of native dimeric and monomeric mutants of rat and human galectin-1 with mono- and divalent small molecules, fetuin, asialofetuin, and human serum glycoproteins was analyzed. Surprisingly, high-affinity binding did not depend much on the dimeric state of galectin-1 and thus is due mainly to monomeric interactions of a single carbohydrate recognition domain. The mechanism for this is unknown, but one possibility includes additional interactions that high-affinity ligands make with an extended binding site on the carbohydrate recognition domain. It follows that such weak additional interactions must be important for the biological function of galectin-1 and also for the design of galectin-1 inhibitors.

Synthesis of multivalent lactose derivatives by 1,3-dipolar cycloadditions: selective galectin-1 inhibition.

Acetylene derivatives of phenylalanine, phenethylamine and the multifunctional unnatural amino acids, phenyl-bis-alanine and phenyl-tris-alanine, were synthesized and functionalized with 2-azidoethyl beta-D-galactopyranosyl-(1-->4)-beta-D-glucopyranoside via regioselective copper(I)-mediated 1,3-dipolar cycloaddition to give a panel of mono-, di- and trivalent lactoside derivatives. Evaluation of the compounds as inhibitors against the tumour- and inflammation-related galectin-1, -3, -4N, -4C, -4, -7, -8N and -9N revealed a divalent compound with a Kd value as low as 3.2 microM for galectin-1, which corresponded to a relative potency of 30 per lactose unit as compared to the natural disaccharide ligand lactose. This divalent compound had at least one order of magnitude higher affinity for galectin-1 than for any of the other galectins investigated.