Siglec-9, a Novel Sialic Acid Binding Member of the Immunoglobulin Superfamily Expressed Broadly on Human Blood Leukocytes*

Abstract

Here we characterize the properties and expression pattern of Siglec-9 (sialic acid-bindingIg-like lectin-9), a new member of the Siglec subgroup of the immunoglobulin superfamily. A full-length cDNA encoding Siglec-9 was isolated from a dibutyryl cAMP-treated HL-60 cell cDNA library. Siglec-9 is predicted to contain three extracellular immunoglobulin-like domains that comprise an N-terminal V-set domain and two C2-set domains, a transmembrane region and a cytoplasmic tail containing two putative tyrosine-based signaling motifs. Overall, Siglec-9 is ∼80% identical in amino acid sequence to Siglec-7, suggesting that the genes encoding these two proteins arose relatively recently by gene duplication. Binding assays showed that, similar to Siglec-7, Siglec-9 recognized sialic acid in either the α2,3- or α2,6-glycosidic linkage to galactose. Using a specific mAb, Siglec-9 was found to be expressed at high or intermediate levels by monocytes, neutrophils, and a minor population of CD16⁺, CD56⁻ cells. Weaker expression was observed on ∼50% of B cells and NK cells and minor subsets of CD8⁺ T cells and CD4⁺ T cells. These results show that despite their high degree of sequence similarity, Siglec-7 and Siglec-9 have distinct expression profiles.