Wheat Germ Agglutinin (WGA), Rhodamine

The acceptor sugar of WGA is N-acetylglucosamine, which preferentially binds to dimers and trimers of this sugar. WGA can bind oligosaccharides with n-acetylglucosamine or chitosan at the end, a structure common to many serum and membrane glycoproteins. Bacterial cell wall peptidoglycans, chitin, chondrosaminoglycans and glycolipids can also bind WGA. Native WGA has also been reported to interact with some glycoproteins via sialic acid residues (see succinylated WGA). Rhodamine-labeled WGA has the appropriate amount of fluorescent dye binding to provide the best staining properties for this lectin. This conjugated substance basically does not contain unconjugated fluorescent dyes. The excitation maximum is 550 nm and the emission maximum is 575 nm.