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Title Targeted identification of Schistosoma mansoni egg glycans
Full text http://hdl.handle.net/1887/12607
Date 2008
Author(s) Robijn, Marjolein Louise Maria
Abstract Schistosomiasis, also known as bilharzia, is a disease that still occurs in many parts of Africa, the Middle East and Southern America, mainly Brasil and the Caribbean. Schistosomiasis is, after malaria, the second most common parasitic infection. Currently 200 million people are infected with the worms that cause the disease. Schistosoma mansoni is the most common schistosome species that infects humans. The schistosome produces many different sugar structures (glycans) that are not made by humans. Central to this thesis are sugar structures with a "double fucose". Such fucosylated glycans are mainly produced by the eggs, which play a major role in the disease schistosomiasis. The human immune defence system responds to these parasite glycans in several ways. High antibody responses have been measured against sugar structures with a "double fucose" moiety and different types of immune cells interact with these glycan structures. Despite these immunological responses the human host is not able to clear the parasitic infection. Glycans are thought to play a role in the mechanisms that S. mansoni has developed to survive in the hostile environment of the human blood. In this thesis the structures of several glycans containing the "double fucose" moiety have been characterised using different mass spectrometric techniques.
Subject(s) Schistosoma mansoni egg antigens; Schistosomiasis; Oligosaccharides; Fucose; Glycoproteins; Anti-carbohydrate monoclonal antibody; Affinity chromatography; Mass spectrometry; MALDI-TOF MS; Diagnosis
Language en
Publisher Department of Parasitology, Center of Infectious Diseases, Faculty of Medicine, Leiden University Medical Center (LUMC), Leiden University
Type of publication Doctoral thesis
Format application/pdf; application/pdf; application/pdf
Repository Leiden - Africanists at University of Leiden
Added to C-A: 2008-12-22;03:23:03