Celiac.com 12/01/2015 - Lectins are carbohydrate binding proteins which promote inflammatory responses like Crohn's disease, systemic lupus, asthma, and rheumatoid arthritis. They were discovered over 100 years ago and cause leaky gut and gastrointestinal dysbiosis yet the push for a plant-based diet focusing on legumes as meat alternatives has overlooked the damage lectins cause to the gut. Legumes offer inferior nutrition compared to animal proteins so toxicity needs to be considered when recommending food choices.
As carbohydrate binding proteins, lectins are difficult to digest and irritate the brush border of the small intestine. Consequently, the tight junctions of the microvilli are damaged by prolamin and agglutinins which can lead to numerous disorders of the gastrointestinal...

Celiac.com 05/16/2018 - Galectins are a family of animal lectins marked by their affinity for N-acetyllactosamine-enriched glycoconjugates. Galectins control several immune cell processes and influence both innate and adaptive immune responses. A team of researchers recently set out to assess the role of galectins, particularly galectin-1 (Gal-1), in the treatment of celiac disease.
The research team included Victoria Sundblad, Amado A. Quintar, Luciano G. Morosi, Sonia I. Niveloni, Ana Cabanne, Edgardo Smecuol, Eduardo Mauriño, Karina V. Mariño, Julio C. Bai, Cristina A. Maldonado, and Gabriel A. Rabinovich.
The researchers examined the role of galectins in intestinal inflammation, particularly in Crohn’s disease, ulcerative colitis, and celiac disease patients, as well as i...

Celiac.com 11/02/2019 - Now that celiac disease has been allowed official entry into the pantheon of established medical conditions, and gluten intolerance is no longer entirely a fringe medical concept, the time has come to draw attention to the powerful little chemical in wheat known as ‘wheat germ agglutinin’ (WGA) which is largely responsible for many of wheat’s pervasive, and difficult to diagnose, ill effects.  Not only does WGA throw a monkey wrench into our assumptions about the primary causes of wheat intolerance, but due to the fact that WGA is found in highest concentrations in “whole wheat,” including its supposedly superior sprouted form, it also pulls the rug out from under one of the health food industry’s favorite poster children.  
Below the radar of conventional ...

Celiac.com 04/07/2020 - In the past few years, clinicians have begun to use of specific sugar residue seeking dietary proteins, called lectins, to topographically map the small intestinal cell surface and goblet cell secretory mucins to reveal the tissue's structure and function. Better understanding of the gut microbiome may be crucial to discovering the origins and modes of development of celiac disease and other sprue-like intestinal disorders.
Researcher Hugh James Freeman of the Department of Medicine, Gastroenterology, at the University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC, Canada recently set out to examine the relationship between topographic lectin mapping of the epithelial cell surface in normal intestine and celiac disease.
Researchers are still in the dark about th...