Chemical biology tools for studying carbohydrate processing enzymes

用糖修饰蛋白质被称为蛋白质糖基化，这是所有生命王国中细胞蛋白质的一种常见修饰。糖基化在多细胞真核生物中尤其丰富，在这些真核生物中，超过一半的蛋白质被连接在一起的糖修饰，形成了众所周知的葡聚糖。人类基因组中约300个基因致力于糖共轭化合物的调节，突显了这些物种所发挥的重要作用。负责构建糖共轭的酶是糖基转移酶，而那些分解它们的酶称为糖苷酶。这些酶的重要性在于它们在调节糖结合物的结构和丰度方面所起的作用，糖结合物被发现可以改变蛋白质的功能，调节分子间的相互作用，并改变蛋白质的稳定性。过去几年的惊人发现也表明，蛋白质糖基化直接调节信号和转录。最近，美国国家科学院和国家研究理事会将糖科学领域确定为一个有前途的新兴研究领域，值得大量投资。

The modification of proteins with sugars is known as protein glycosylation and is a common modification of cellular proteins in all kingdoms of life. Glycosylation is particularly abundant in multicellular eukaryotes, where over half of all proteins are thought to be modified by sugars linked together for form what are known as glycans. The dedication of approximately 300 genes within the human genome to the regulation of glycoconjugates highlights the important roles played by these species. The enzymes responsible for building of glycoconjugates are glycosyltransferases and those that break them down are known as glycosidases. The importance of these enzymes rests in the roles they play in regulating the structures and abundance of glycoconjugates, which have been found to alter protein function, mediate molecular interactions, and alter the stability of proteins. Striking findings in the past few years have also shown that protein glycosylation acts directly to regulate signaling and transcription. Recently, the National Academy of Sciences and National Research Council (USA) identified the area of glycoscience as a promising and emerging area of research that merits significant investment.