Dr. Dorothy Zolandz and Dr. Katherine W Bowman of the National Research Council of the National Academy of Sciences is supported by the Division of Chemistry, the Division of Molecular and Cellular Biosciences, and the Division of Materials Research of the NSF to convene a study to assess the importance and impact of glycomics and glycosciences research and the status of such research in the U.S. It will examine strategies to enhance or develop the workforce, tools, and capabilities needed to advance glycosciences and glycomics in order to build on knowledge from genomics and proteomics.
A rapidly increasing amount of research is being undertaken on glycobiology and glycochemistry, and many of the techniques and lessons applied to one cell type and system may be applicable to the study of others. The fields are poised to benefit from the development of a strategic vision for glycoscience and glycomics that crosses boundaries of funding agencies and research fields, including tools for characterization and analysis, databases and data management, and other fundamental infrastructure. The proposed activity will advance US research in areas such as the conversion of biomass to fuel, biomass for material application, and cell-cell communication and recognition. The proposed activity will also help build the infrastructure for chemical, biological, and materials research.
Glycans form one of the four basic classes of macromolecules in living systems, along with nucleic acids, proteins, and lipids. They are composed of individual sugar units that can be linked to one another in multiple ways, enabling them to form complex three-dimensional structures. Glycans are involved in myriad processes that are part of normal cellular physiology, development, and signaling, as well as in the development of both chronic and infectious diseases. Glycans on cell surfaces are involved in molecular recognition and signaling as well as cell adhesion and cell movement. Meanwhile, glycans on proteins inside cells participate in the cell’s responses to incoming signals, for example by helping to modulate gene expression and protein functions. Glycan polymers such as cellulose are important components of plant cell walls. Understanding how such walls are assembled and how they can be deconstructed is fundamental to basic plant biology, and also to the development of applications such as efficient conversion of biomass into fuels. Glycan polymers derived from plants and other organisms can also serve as sources of new materials with wide-ranging applications from tissue engineering scaffolds to flexible electronic displays. Achieving an understanding of the structures and functions of glycans is fundamental to understanding biology. The National Research Council report resulting from this project, Transforming Glycoscience: A Roadmap for the Future, discusses the impact glycoscience can have across health, energy, and materials science and lays out a roadmap of research goals whose achievement could help the field become a widely-recognized and integrated discipline rather than a niche area studied by a small number of specialists. Despite advances, gaps remain in the current suite of tools for investigating glycans and these tools often require expert users and facilities, presenting a barrier for many investigators. The report identified needs for a glycoscience toolkit, including: Glycan Synthesis Widely applicable methods to generate both large and small quantities of glycans are needed to allow researchers to characterize the glycomes of various organisms, study glycans isolated at the intermediate steps of reactions, and produce glycans for use as therapeutic drugs or in new polymer materials. The development of transformative methods for the facile synthesis of carbohydrates and glycoconjugates should be a high priority for the National Institutes of Health, the National Science Foundation, the Department of Energy, and other relevant stakeholders. Glycan Analysis A suite of tools analogous to those available for studying nucleic acids and proteins is needed to detect, describe, and purify glycans from natural sources, and characterize their chemical composition and structure. The development of transformative tools for detection, imaging, separation, and high-resolution structure determination of carbohydrate structures and complex mixtures should be a high priority for the National Institutes of Health, the National Science Foundation, the Department of Energy, and the Food and Drug Administration, and other relevant stakeholders. Molecular Modeling Continued advances in molecular modeling can generate insights for understanding glycan structures and properties. Robust, validated informatics tools should be developed in order to enable accurate carbohydrate and glycoconjugate structural prediction, computational modeling, and data mining. This capability will broaden access of glycoscience data to the entire scientific community. Glycoenzymes An expanded toolbox of enzymes and enzyme inhibitors would help scientists produce, degrade, and study the function of glycans of interest, driving progress in many areas of science. The development of transformative capabilities for perturbing carbohydrate and glycoconjugate structure, recognition, metabolism, and biosynthesis should be a high priority for the National Science Foundation, the National Institutes of Health, the Department of Energy, and other relevant stakeholders. Informatics and Databases The development of a centralized, accessible glycan database, linked to other molecular databases, is needed to make full use of the knowledge generated by an expanded effort in glycoscience. A long-term-funded, stable, integrated, centralized database, including mammalian, plant and microbial carbohydrates and glycoconjugates, should be established as a collaborative effort by all stakeholders. The carbohydrate structural database needs to be fully cross-referenced with databases that provide complementary biological information, for example, Protein Data Bank and GenBank. Furthermore, there should be a requirement for deposition of new structures into the database using a reporting standard for minimal information. Education Building glycoscience into education would broaden the community of glycoscientists and enable members of the scientific community to integrate glycoscience into their research in order to realize the full potential of biological and chemical sciences. Integrating glycoscience into relevant disciplines in high school, undergraduate, and graduate education, and developing curricula and standardized testing for science competency would increase public as well as professional awareness. The report is available for free download at www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=13446.
