Redefining Allergy Treatment With a New Innovative Approach

Hence, it is important to develop therapies with the potential to change the allergic asthmatic disease course. This will require the discovery of targets that play a central role during the initiation of an allergic response, such as those involved in the process of allergen recognition.

Breakthrough That Could Make Allergies a Thing of the Past

In the quest for such a process, researchers wanted to find a new approach to keep allergen receptors from reacting in the first place. So they utilized a technique called LRC-TriCEPS – which identifies receptors in cells — for a common allergen, house dust mite.

Before this discovery, LMAN1 was generally known as a cargo receptor – a protein that transports other proteins inside and outside the cell(). However, researchers demonstrated that house dust mite allergens and LMAN1 can bind together on the cell surface to cause inflammatory or allergic reactions.

Further research showed that the binding depended on specific mannose sugar structures on the house dust mite allergens. This discovery has tremendous potential since many other common allergens, including pollen and fungi, are mannosylated, or modified by the addition of mannose sugars.

The thinking is that this could potentially not just be restricted to dust mites because many other allergens are mannosylated, this could be a very broad receptor that recognizes many different allergens.

LMAN 1 has been largely known as a protein that is involved in transporting proteins from inside cells to the outside of cells. This research is the first one to show an entirely new function of LMAN1, as a receptor to bring proteins, such as allergens, from outside of cells to the inside. This could open up a new pathway for treatment().

With hundreds of thousands of allergic asthma cases in the United States every year, and many more worldwide, this research represents a step forward toward helping these patients.

Many treatments can only be prescribed if you meet certain clinical criteria, many treatments are cost prohibitive, and many are not covered by insurance. So, any new treatment we can put forth that could potentially be more universal would always be an advance.

Researchers are now researching to confirm their hypothesis that other mannosylated allergens, such as pollen, are also recognized by LMAN1. If true, this could have broad implications in future therapies for many of the most common allergens.

References:

1. Thomson, Neil C, and Rekha Chaudhuri. Omalizumab: clinical use for the management of asthma. Clinical medicine insights. Circulatory, respiratory and pulmonary medicine. 2012.(https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.4137/CCRPM.S7793)
2. Zhang Y, Zhu M, Zheng C, Wei W, Emmer BT, Zhang B. LMAN1-MCFD2 complex is a cargo receptor for the ER-Golgi transport of α1-antitrypsin. Biochem J. 2022.(https://portlandpress.com/biochemj/article/479/7/839/231073/LMAN1-MCFD2-complex-is-a-cargo-receptor-for-the-ER)
3. Miller, Madelyn H. et al. LMAN1 is a receptor for house dust mite allergens. Cell Reports. March 2023.(https://www.cell.com/cell-reports/fulltext/S2211-1247(23)00219-X?_returnURL=https%3A%2F%2Flinkinghub.elsevier.com%2Fretrieve%2Fpii%2FS221112472300219X%3Fshowall%3Dtrue)

Source: Eurekalert