The Biological Role of Enveloped Virus Glycosylation and Its Interactions with Antiviral Lectins

Viral glycoproteins play an important role in the virus life cycle, especially for enveloped viruses, but they can also become targets for antiviral lectins. This chapter seeks to highlight how viruses exploit glycans for their benefit, including protein folding, protein stability, immune evasion, and glycan-lectin interactions in cell attachment and entry. Furthermore, this chapter discusses human endogenous lectins in the collectin and ficolin family that participate in innate immunity and antiviral defense through direct neutralization, opsonization, and activation of the complement cascade. Finally, this chapter brings up a few examples from a diverse group of xenogenous lectins that show potential as antiviral agents, with the ability to bind and neutralize enveloped viruses.