Molecular heterogeneity of mucin as a potential biomarker for inflammatory airway disorders: identification of detection reagents

Evidence accumulates that airway mucins harbour disease-related alterations in their composition and glycosylation. For cystic fibrosis patients a correlation between the severity of airway infections and an increase in mucin sialylation was described. A similar change in glycosylation was observed upon the induction of asthma in experimental animals. In case of COPD the ratio of the two major airway mucins MUC5AC and MUC5B was reported to differ from that in healthy individuals. This opens the possibility to diagnose and monitor inflammatory airway disorders based on the composition and glycosylation of the muc…