{"doi":"10.1093/infdis/jiab384","title":"EphA2 Is a Lung Epithelial Cell Receptor for <i>Pneumocystis</i> β-Glucans","abstract":"Pneumocystis species interaction with myeloid cells is well known, especially in macrophages; however, how the organism binds to lung epithelial cells is incompletely understood. Ephrin type-A receptor 2 (EphA2) has been previously identified as a lung epithelial pattern recognition receptor that binds to fungal β-glucans. Herein, we also report that EphA2 can also bind Pneumocystis β-glucans, both in isolated forms and also on exposed surfaces of the organism. Furthermore, binding of Pneumocystis β-glucans resulted in phosphorylation of the EphA2 receptor, which has been shown to be important for downstream proinflammatory response. Indeed, we also show that interleukin 6 cytokine is significantly increased when lung epithelial cells are exposed to Pneumocystis β-glucans, and that this response could be blocked by preincubation with a specific antibody to EphA2. Our study presents another Pneumocystis lung epithelial cell receptor with implications for initial colonization and possible therapeutic intervention.","journal":"The Journal of Infectious Diseases","year":2021,"id":177538,"datarank":0.0,"base_score":0.0,"endowment":0.0,"self_citation_contribution":0.0,"citation_network_contribution":0.0,"self_endowment_contribution":0.0,"citer_contribution":0.0,"corpus_percentile":null,"corpus_rank":null,"citation_count":20,"citer_count":0,"citers_with_citation_signal":0,"citers_with_endowment":0,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_dataset_confidence":0.9535,"is_data_producer":false,"deposit_databanks":null,"is_oa":true,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"has_version_chain":false,"published_date":"2021-01-01","fair_score":null,"fair_percentile":null,"algorithm_id":"datarank_citation_only_1hop_v6","ranking_scope":"data_only","authors":[{"id":414863,"name":"Kyle Schaefbauer","orcid":null,"position":1,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":389116,"name":"Eva M. Carmona","orcid":"0000-0001-9852-8396","position":2,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":256587,"name":"Andrew H. Limper","orcid":"0000-0001-5671-6874","position":3,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":389115,"name":"Theodore J. Kottom","orcid":"0000-0003-0364-3311","position":0,"is_corresponding":true}],"reference_count":24,"raw_metadata":null,"created_at":"2026-07-18T23:47:32.096934Z","pmid":"34289046","pmcid":null,"fwci":null,"citation_percentile":null,"influential_citations":0,"oa_status":null,"license":null,"views":0,"total_file_size_bytes":0,"version_count":0,"fair_f":null,"fair_a":null,"fair_i":null,"fair_r":null,"fair_zscore":null,"fair_rationale":null,"fair_model":null,"fair_agent_version":null,"fair_fulltext_source":null,"fair_has_llm":null,"fair_computed_at":null,"clinical_trials":[],"software_tools":[],"db_accessions":[],"linked_datasets":[],"topics":[]}