[Synopsis] Food allergy is a hypersensitivity reaction mediated by immunological mechanisms to foods. The causative components are mainly proteins. Foods responsible for causing food allergy include animal foods and plant-based foods, but this article focuses on plant foods and introduces allergens in vegetables, fruits, and crops. And, the diversity of the mechanism in which the food allergy is contracted has been noticed recently. Though the sensitization route has diversity, in recent years, "transdermal sensitization" has been noticed as a new sensitization route. Transdermal sensitization is the invasion of allergen molecule from the skin, and the sensitization is established. There are many unclear points such as the characteristics of the allergen which is easy to be sensitized transdermally, and the elucidation of the details is required. This review introduces the percutaneous sensitization potential of agricultural crops, mainly fruits and soybeans, including our research findings. And using specific antibodies against these allergens, we performed quantitative and qualitative risk variation analysis of allergens in plant food by various treatment, processing method, cultivation method, cultivar, etc. In this review, we also introduce our research findings on these fluctuation analyses.

Departmental Bulletin Paper

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