Toward multivalent carbohydrate drugs

Proteins that bind and/or convert carbohydrate structures represent a vast potential for therapeutic development. The use of multivalency is nature's solution to overcome the limited affinities of carbohydrate ligands and has also proven to be a successful strategy for inhibitor development. Suitable protein targets are those with closely spaced binding sites such as the cholera toxin B-subunit. However, also protein targets of unknown tertiary and quaternary structure, such as the adhesion protein of the pig pathogen Streptococcus suis, have experimentally proven to be highly suitable. To enhance the search process for new multivalent ligands for new targets, a glycodendrimer microarray technology is developed which rapidly identifies multivalency effects using little precious protein and ligand material.

Section editor:Peter Timmerman – Pepscan Therapeutics B.V., PO Box 2098, 8203 AB Lelystad, The Netherlands