Histochemical Localization of Carbohydrates in Morphological Stages of Developing Human Minor Salivary Glands: A Comparative Study with Cytoskeletal Markers

carbohydrates play a critical role in many cellular processes like disease, growth and development. in this work lectins, proteins that recognizes carbohydrate free or conjugated, were used as histochemical probes for carbohydrates localization in developing human minor salivary gland. immunohistochemistry for traditional cytoskeleton markers (cks 7, 8, 13, 14, 19, sma and vimentin) was performed and then compared whit lectin histochemistry for pna, wga, cona and uea-i, specifics for d-galactose, n-acetyl-glucosamine, glucose/mannose and l-fucose respectively. for this, specimens were obtained from tongues and lips of 15 human foetuses at 10-28 weeks of gestation. none of immune cytoskeleton markers were identified in the first stage of development differing from carbohydrate markers. uea-i, wga and pna recognized their specific carbohydrate residues in all stages analyzed varying the staining intensity and cell types. ck8 and n-acetyl-glucosamine were expressed in canalicular, branching and cytodifferentiation stages while sma and glucose/mannose were observed in the cytodifferentiation stage one. cona only recognized myoepithelial cells on cytodifferentiation stages because of this specificity cona could be used as biomarker of myoepithelial cells on cytodifferentiation. lectin histochemistry suggests that l-fucose, d-galactose e n-acetyl-glucosamine are intensily and previously expressed than traditional cytoskeletal markers in human minor salivary gland during development.