AI Article Synopsis

  • Monoclonal antibodies (mAbs) are vital biopharmaceuticals, primarily relying on the Fc portion's interaction with Fcγ receptors to mediate immune responses, where N-glycosylation plays a crucial role.
  • This research utilized in silico methods to analyze how different glycosylation patterns, particularly fucose, affect the 3D structure and flexibility of mAbs, using adalimumab as a model.
  • The findings suggest that fucose introduces conformational constraints affecting receptor interaction and highlights the role of glycan-induced asymmetry in antibody structure, potentially guiding future drug development strategies.

Article Abstract

Currently, monoclonal antibodies (mAbs) are the most used biopharmaceuticals for human therapy. One of the key aspects in their development is the control of effector functions mediated by the interaction between fragment crystallizable (Fc) and Fcγ receptors, which is a secondary mechanism of the action of biotherapeutics. N-glycosylation at the Fc portion can regulate these mechanisms, and much experimental evidence suggests that modifications of glycosidic chains can affect antibody binding to FcγRIIIa, consequently impacting the immune response. In this work, we try to elucidate via in silico procedures the structural role exhibited by glycans, particularly fucose, in mAb conformational freedom that can potentially affect the receptor recognition. By using adalimumab, a marketed IgG1, as a general template, after rebuilding its three-dimensional (3D) structure through homology modeling approaches, we carried out molecular dynamics simulations of three differently glycosylated species: aglycosylated, afucosylated, and fucosylated antibody. Trajectory analysis showed different dynamical behaviors and pointed out that sugars can influence the overall 3D structure of the antibody. As a result, we propose a putative structural mechanism by which the presence of fucose introduces conformational constraints in the whole antibody and not only in the Fc domain, preventing a conformation suitable for the interaction with the receptor. As secondary evidence, we observed a high flexibility of the antibodies that is translated into an asymmetric behavior of Fab portions shown by all the simulated biopolymers, making the dynamical asymmetry a new, to our knowledge, molecular aspect that may be further investigated. In conclusion, these findings can help understand the contribution of sugars on the structural architecture of mAbs, paving the way to novel strategies of pharmaceutical development.

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http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8715174PMC
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.bpj.2021.10.026DOI Listing

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