Introduction to Glycomics

Carbohydrates are one of the basic substances that make up living organisms and play an important role in various life activities. At present, there is no living body that can exist without carbohydrates. Carbohydrates are not only the main source of cell energy, but also play an important role in cell construction, cell biosynthesis, and regulation of cell life activities. Glycomics is a subject from the perspective of analyzing and deciphering the information contained in all carbohydrates at a specific stage of a living being or a cell, to study the molecular structure, micro-inhomogeneity, expression regulation, interaction of carbohydrates with recognition molecules, and the relationship to diseases. Therefore, glycomics research not only needs to obtain the sugar group expressed by an organism in a certain period or a certain state, but also needs to further analyze the reasons for the production of each component of the sugar group and the biological function and significance of the production.
The study of glycomics is indispensable in the comprehensive and systematic understanding of the life activities of organisms. Almost all microorganisms and viruses infect humans by attaching sugar chains to the cell surface. Glycomics has implications for future research into the diagnosis and prevention of infectious diseases. After the completion of human genome mapping, relevant research entered the post-genome era. The main research trend is to analyze the protein expression and its function in different tissues and organs at different stages. Posttranslational modifications of proteins can regulate the structure and function of proteins. Posttranslational modification analysis of proteins has been paid more and more attention. Protein glycosylation is one of the most important protein modifications. Therefore, glycomics research is one of the important contents of protein post-translational modification research.
The synthesis of carbohydrates is not directly controlled by the genome, but is regulated by the expression of carbohydrate-related genes encoded by the genes, such as glycosyltransferase, glucosidase and sulfonyl transferase. A class of proteins that interact with the glycosylchain or glycolipid glycosylchain, known as glycosylbinding proteins or lectins, have biological functions such as regulating inter-cell recognition, signal transmission, cell endocytosis, intracellular material transport and infection of external pathogenic microorganisms. Therefore, in the process of glycomics research, it is also necessary to consider the changes in the expression of related carbohydrate genes and carbohydrate binding proteins.
The synthesis of carbohydrates is not directly controlled by the genome, but is regulated by the expression of carbohydrate-related genes such as glycosyltransferase, glycosidase and sulfotransferase encoded by the gene. In addition, there is a class of proteins that interact with glycoprotein sugar chains or glycolipid sugar chains, called glyco-binding proteins or lectins, which regulate cell-to-cell recognition, signal transmission, cell endocytosis, and intracellular biological functions such as material transportation and infection of external pathogenic microorganisms. Therefore, in the process of glycomics research, it is also necessary to consider the changes in the expression of related carbohydrate genes and carbohydrate binding proteins. The sugar chains on cell surface glycoproteins and glycolipids are presenters of information functions, and play a role in cell-cell and cell-extracellular matrix information transmission. As an information molecule, sugar chains are involved in all the spatial and temporal processes of various types of cell life, such as sperm and egg recognition, tissue and organ morphology and aging, and the occurrence of diseases such as cancer.
Glycomics complements each other with genomics, proteomics, lipidomics and metabonomics, and is an indispensable part of a comprehensive analysis of biological activities.