Highlight: Dolce vita - a sample from European glycobiology

摘要

Glycobiology bridges the classical disciplines of biology and biochemistry with carbohydrate chemistry and is a relatively novel discipline. In Germany the term was first introduced in 1977, when the study group 'Glykobiologie' of the Gesellschaft fur Biochemie und Molekularbiologie was founded. In the UK the term was coined in 1988 by Professor Raymond Dwek in a seminal review and soon found its way into the Oxford English Dictionary.While in the fields of genomics and proteomics great technological advances have been made, providing a wealth of data, the development of comparable glycomics technology is particularly challenging as glycan synthesis is not a template-driven process but typically depends on the interplay of many different genes and proteins. This 'Highlight' issue of Biological Chemistry compiles contributions from various European glycobiologists on recent research in glycan biosynthesis, structural analysis and function.