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Presenting fats with SAPs

Nature Immunology volume 5, pages 126–127 (2004)Cite this article

CD1 presents lipids to unique subsets of T cells, but how are these lipids loaded onto CD1? A series of three papers has shed light on the molecules that facilitate this process.

An effective antigen-presenting function requires the surveillance of different intracellular compartments. To achieve this, antigen-presenting cells orchestrate the intracellular trafficking of both antigens and antigen-presenting molecules. The peptide presentation pathways for the major histocompatibility complex (MHC)-encoded class I and class II molecules have been partially elucidated. However, much less is known about the intracellular pathways leading to lipid presentation by the CD1 family of molecules. As lipids tend to insert into the bilayer of membranes, an unresolved issue is the means by which lipids are removed from membranes for loading of CD1 molecules. Two reports in this issue of Nature Immunology, by Kang and Cresswell and Winau et al., as well as a recent paper by Zhou et al. in Science1,2,3, have revealed that the sphingolipid activator proteins (SAPs) are chief participants in the loading of CD1, and they provide important insight into their mechanism of action.

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Figure 1: Five steps in the traffic and antigen loading of human CD1b and mouse CD1d molecules.

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  1. La Jolla Institute for Allergy and Immunology, 10355 Science Center Drive, San Diego, 92121, California, USA

    Mitchell Kronenberg

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  1. Mitchell Kronenberg
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Kronenberg, M. Presenting fats with SAPs. Nat Immunol 5, 126–127 (2004). https://doi.org/10.1038/ni0204-126

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/ni0204-126

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