Sesamin Clinical Study

Allergenicity of some isoforms of white sesame proteins.

Fremont S, Zitouni N, Kanny G, Veneri V, Metche M, Moneret-Vautrin DA, Nicolas JP.

Laboratory of Medical and Paediatric Fiochemistry and Department of Internal Medicine and Clinical Immunology, University Nancy I, France. rremont@ibmp.u-nancy.fr

BACKGROUND:
Allergy to sesame seeds is often associated with particularly severe reactions, with a high risk of anaphylaxis. The increase in reports of allergic reactions to sesame is probably due to the growing use of sesame seeds or sesame oil in food.

OBJECTIVE:
To determine the molecular weights of the proteins in three variety of sesame seeds and to study the isoelectric points and the allergenicity of white sesame proteins.

METHODS:
Extracts of white, brown and black sesame seeds were prepared. The white sesame extract, mostly used in bakery, was run on SDS-PAGE and two dimensional electrophoresis. Six sera from patients sensitized or symptomatic to sesame seed were used for Western blotting.

RESULTS:
The protein patterns of the white, brown and black sesame extracts showed major quantitative differences. The white extract had the higher protein concentration and contained 15 proteins of 12-79 kDa, some of them having several acidic isoelectric points. The lowest isoelectric point was 4.9 and the highest was 6.4, giving 35 isoforms. Ten of the 15 proteins (12-57.5 kDa) were recognized by specific IgE. The 12-13 kDa and 22-33 kDa proteins could correspond to the main allergens.

CONCLUSION:
White sesame seeds contain at least 10 allergenic proteins with acidic isoelectric points. In accordance with previous results, two of them seem to contain the major allergens.

PMID: 12190661 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]

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