Glycolipid Bioengineering

Abstract

Glycosphingolipids present on animal cell surface have several functions such as receptors for toxins and viruses. The research using a monolayer as a biomembrane was found to be useful for the evaluation of receptor function of glycosphingolipid, the selection of a sugar-binding peptide from peptide library and the evaluation of a inhibitor for influenza virus infection, and etc. Furthermore, biocombinatorial syntheses of oligosaccharides using saccharide primers were indicated to be useful for the construction of saccharide library.