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. 2021 Oct 21;13(21):5273. doi: 10.3390/cancers13215273

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© 2021 by the authors.

Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).

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Sialyl Lewis-related antigens and Sd^a antigen in colonic tissues. In normal colon, the expression of sialyl 6-sulfo Le^x antigen (upper) predominates over that of sLe^x. However, the reduced expression of enzymes responsible for its biosynthesis, such as SLC26A2 (formerly DTDST) in colon cancer, leads to the overexpression of sLe^x. The biosynthesis of the di-sialyl Le^a antigen (lower), which predominates in normal colon, proceeds from α2,6 sialylation, catalyzed by ST6GALNAC6, followed by α1,4-fucosylation mediated by FUT3. The downregulation of ST6GALNAC6 in colon cancer leads to sLe^a overexpression. The addition of β1,4-linked GalNAc mediated by B4GALNT2 leads to the expression of the Sd^a, inhibiting that of sLe^x and sLe^a. Cancer-associated structures are boxed in red, while structures associated with normal colon are boxed in blue.