Glycomics

Abstract

Paramount to our understanding of carbohydrates in biology has been the development of methods for analyzing and characterizing the essential features of glycans. This has resulted in a comprehensive appreciation for the various roles of glycans and the pathways associated with their synthesis. Indeed, the importance of glycosylation has been recognized by the biopharmaceutical industry. Therapeutics for a multitude of formerly untreatable diseases are coming on stream and this is largely due to the ability of the biopharmaceutical industry to produce complex proteins carrying appropriate posttranslational modifications. Importantly, glycosylation as a posttranslational modification has taken a prominent role in the focus of bioproduction, as subtle changes in protein glycosylation can significantly impact the safety, efficacy, and biological activity of a therapeutic. In response, the biopharmaceutical industry is dedicated to the generation of expression systems that provide humanized glycosylation to maximize the potency, safety, and pharmacokinetic behavior of glycoprotein therapies. Central to this strategy is the ability to manipulate glycosylation, which is largely dependent on the development of techniques that allow the assessment and characterization of glycans. To be of benefit to the biopharmaceutical industry, methods for glycan analysis will be heavily reliant on platforms that offer robust, rapid, quantifiable, sensitive, and cheap solutions, which can be performed at-line in a high-throughput format. This article provides an introduction to the field of glycomics and how specific aspects of glycosylation have been employed by the biopharmaceutical industry to generate therapeutics with enhanced biological attributes. Methods for the analysis of glycans and associated curation and access of glycan data through bioinformatics are presented.