Methods for the preparation of mammalian oligosaccharides and glycoconjugates.

What is it about?

This review provides a summary of the established methods for the preparation of mammalian glycans covering general aspects of chemoenzymatic syntheses of glycans and their application to the synthesis of naturally occurring glycoconjugate targets (glycosaminoglycans, glycoproteins, glycolipids, GPI-anchored proteins) and vaccine development. The specifics of biosynthesis of different classes of glycans is briefly discussed as they dictate the structural diversity of glycans and set up distinctive requirements for target synthesis. Along the way, readers will be referred to more comprehensive reviews, classical works and the most significant contributions to the covered topics.

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Why is it important?

The bottleneck of glycoscience research is the availability of glycans in homogeneous forms, which can be eliminated with the introduction of reliable, scalable methods of glycan synthesis and preparation of homogeneous glycoconjugates (e.g., glycoproteins). This review provides an update of the most recent achievements in the field and highlights future directions.

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