Use of Carbohydrate-Conjugated Nanoparticles for an Integrated Approach to Functional Imaging of Glycans and Understanding of their Molecular Mechanisms

Functional analysis of carbohydrates is needed to understand the initial interface between membranes and the outer world. For this analysis we need individual protocols such as a method to modify the surfaces of nanoparticles with a variety of carbohydrates effectively and exhaustively, to synthesize an oligosaccharide on each particle’s surface by chemical or enzymatic sugar elongation reaction, and to analyze the binding properties of carbohydrates. In this article, we describe the basic strategies for scooping up proteins from crude sample mixtures via interaction with carbohydrates. This approach was used to identify proteins that interacted with GM2, a ganglioside that is abundant on the surfaces of human lung cancer cells.