Fogarty, C.A. and Harbison, Aoife M. and Dugdale, A.R. and Fadda, Elisa (2020) How and why plants and human N-glycans are different: Insight from molecular dynamics into the “glycoblocks” architecture of complex carbohydrates. Beilstein Journal of Organic Chemistry. ISSN 1860-5397

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Abstract

N-glycosylation is one of the most abundant and diverse post-translational modifications of proteins, implicated in protein folding and structural stability, and mediating interactions with receptors and with the environment. All N-glycans share a common core from which linear or branched arms stem from, with functionalization specific to different species and to the cells’ health and disease state. This diversity generates a rich collection of structures, all diversely able to trigger molecular cascades and to activate pathways, which also include adverse immunogenic responses. These events are inherently linked to the N-glycans 3D architecture and dynamics, which remain for the large part unresolved and undetected because of their intrinsic structural disorder. In this work we use molecular dynamics (MD) simulations to provide insight into N-glycans 3D structure by analysing the effects of a set of very specific modifications found in plants and invertebrate N-glycans, which are immunogenic in humans. We also compare these structural motifs and combine them with mammalian N-glycans motifs to devise strategies for the control of the N-glycan 3D structure through sequence. Our results suggest that the N-glycans architecture can be described in terms of the local spatial environment of groups of monosaccharides. We define these “glycoblocks” as self-contained 3D units, uniquely identified by the nature of the residues they comprise, their linkages and structural/dynamic features. This alternative description of glycans 3D architecture can potentially lead to an easier prediction of sequence-to-structure relationships in complex carbohydrates, with important implications in glycoengineering design.

Item Type:	Article
Keywords:	N-glycans; xylose; fucose; glycoblocks; molecular dynamics; complex carbohydrates; molecular recognition;
Academic Unit:	Faculty of Science and Engineering > Chemistry
Item ID:	15011
Identification Number:	https://doi.org/10.1101/2020.05.22.110528
Depositing User:	Elisa Fadda
Date Deposited:	15 Nov 2021 12:14
Journal or Publication Title:	Beilstein Journal of Organic Chemistry
Publisher:	Beilstein-Institut
Refereed:	Yes
URI:	Publisher
Use Licence:	This item is available under a Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial Share Alike Licence (CC BY-NC-SA). Details of this licence are available here

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