Rachel Chen
Georgia Institute of Technology, USA
Title: Metabolic engineering for oligo- and poly-saccharide synthesis: challenges and opportunities
Biography
Biography: Rachel Chen
Abstract
As one of the four building blocks of life, sugar molecules permeate almost all aspects of life. They are also unique in being intimately associated with all major types of biopolymers (including DNA/RNA, proteins, lipids) meanwhile they stand alone as bioactive polysaccharides, or free soluble oligosaccharides. The widespread occurrence of glycosylation and its broad impact in biological processes underscores the importance of studying glycosylation. To study glycans and probe their roles in a biological system significant amount of pure molecules are needed. Besides basic research, there are a wide range of opportunities of utilizing oligosaccharides, polysaccharides, and glycoproteins and other glycoconjugates for diagnosis, vaccine development, as new drug entities, and many other medical applications. Unfortunately, these potential applications are all impeded by the lack of large scale synthesis technology for these molecules. Metabolic engineering, since its inception in late 80’s, has grown to be a field impactful in the synthesis of a variety of molecules of commercial and societal importance. Opportunities abound at the interface of glycosciences and metabolic engineering. In fact, all sugar moieties in biological components, small or big, free or bound, are important targets for metabolic engineering. Over the past decades, its use in the synthesis of sugar-containing molecules has gained significance. In this presentation, metabolic engineering challenges common to glycosyltransferase-catalyzed synthesis of oligosaccharides and polysaccharides are analyzed and successful examples from Chen and other labs are showcased to emphasize the power of metabolic engineering as an enabling technology.
