Glycans are ubiquitous in nature, decorating our cells and serving as the initial points of contact with any visiting entities. These glycan interactions are fundamental to host-pathogen recognition and are related to various diseases, including inflammation and cancer. Therefore, understanding the conformations and dynamics of glycans, as well as the key features that regulate their interactions with proteins, is crucial for designing new therapeutics. Due to the intrinsic flexibility of glycans, NMR is an essential tool for unravelling these properties. In this review, we describe the key NMR parameters that can be extracted from the different experiments, and which allow us to deduce the necessary geometry and molecular motion information, with a special emphasis on assessing the internal motions of the glycosidic linkages. We specifically address the NMR peculiarities of various natural glycans, from histo-blood group antigens to glycosaminoglycans, and also consider the special characteristics of their synthetic analogues (glycomimetics). Finally, we discuss the application of NMR protocols to study glycan-related molecular recognition events, both from the carbohydrate and receptor perspectives, including the use of stable isotopes and paramagnetic NMR methods to overcome the inherent degeneracy of glycan chemical shifts.

中文翻译：

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游离寡糖构象、动力学和相互作用的 NMR 研究


聚糖在自然界中无处不在，装饰着我们的细胞，并作为与任何来访实体的初始接触点。这些聚糖相互作用是宿主-病原体识别的基础，与各种疾病有关，包括炎症和癌症。因此，了解聚糖的构象和动力学，以及调节它们与蛋白质相互作用的关键特征，对于设计新的治疗方法至关重要。由于游离寡糖固有的柔韧性，NMR 是揭示这些特性的重要工具。在这篇综述中，我们描述了可以从不同实验中提取的关键 NMR 参数，这些参数使我们能够推断必要的几何形状和分子运动信息，特别强调评估糖苷键的内部运动。我们专门研究了各种天然聚糖的 NMR 特性，从组织血型抗原到糖胺聚糖，还考虑了其合成类似物（拟糖剂）的特殊特性。最后，我们从碳水化合物和受体的角度讨论了 NMR 方案在研究聚糖相关分子识别事件中的应用，包括使用稳定同位素和顺磁性 NMR 方法来克服聚糖化学变化的固有简并性。