Fluorescent glycan derivatives: their use for natural glycan microarrays

Glycan microarrays have become powerful tools in the investigation of biological systems because they enable fast, quantitative, and simultaneous analysis of glycan-protein interactions with small quantities of samples. One hurdle in the construction of glycan microarrays is to obtain a diverse set of glycans for immobilization on surfaces. An article in this issue of ACS Chemical Biology describes the microscale preparation of fluorescently labeled reactive glycans in a cyclic form of the reducing sugar, from natural sources, that can be utilized directly to create natural glycan microarrays for use in functional glycomics.