Naturally Abundant Venom Peptide from Ants Can Activate a Pseudo-Allergic Pathway Unraveling a Novel Immunomodulatory Pathway of MRGPRX2

Ants are omnipresent, and we often get blisters after an ant bite. But do you know the molecular mechanism behind this reaction? A research team led by Professor Billy K.C. Chow from the Research Division for Molecular and Cell Biology, Faculty of Science, the University of Hong Kong (HKU), in collaboration with Dr. Jerome Leprince from The Institut National de la Santé et de la Recherche Médicale (INSERM) and Professor Michel Treilhou from the Institut National Universitaire Champollion in France, have identified and demonstrated a novel small peptide isolated from ant venom can initiate an immune pathway via a pseudo-allergic receptor MRGPRX2. The study was published online on June 6, 2021 in The Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology. The open-access article is titled “P17 Induces Chemotaxis and Differentiation of Monocytes via MRGPRX2-Mediated Mast Cell–Line Activation.”