Chemistry Seminar - Probing Specific Interactions of Synthetic Cell-Surface Carbohydrates with Disease-Related Proteins

Title:  Probing Specific Interactions of Synthetic Cell-Surface Carbohydrates with Disease-Related Proteins

Speaker:  Professor Shang-Cheng Hung, Genomics Research Center, Academia Sinica, Taipei

Abstract: Glycans are exceptionally diverse and complex that deciphering the functions embedded within the glycome is a substantial challenge. The multiple regio- and stereochemical permutations for linking several monosaccharide units and the modifications that may follow chain assembly allowed these complex sugars to hold structural information densities that surpass DNA or proteins. With biosynthetic pathways that are regulated rather than template driven, the sugars are usually expressed as an array of related structures that may possess subtle differences in activity. Several biological processes involve glycans, yet understanding their ligand specificities is impeded by their inherent diversity and difficult acquisition. Generating synthetic sugar libraries for bioevaluations forms the core of chemoglycomics approaches to unravel glycan structural information. A combination of “regioselective one-pot protection” and “stereoselective one-pot glycosylation” strategies to prepare a variety of cell-surface carbohydrates will be presented. Affinity screening and further X-ray co-crystal analysis of these synthesized sugars with disease-related proteins to provide key insights at the molecular level will be also highlighted.

Biography: Prof Shang-Cheng Hung received his Ph.D. degree in Chemistry from the National Tsing Hua University, Taiwan in 1992. He did postdoctoral studies with Prof Andrew Streitwieser at the University of California at Berkeley (1994-1995) and with Prof. Chi-Huey Wong at The Scripps Research Institute (1995-1998), respectively. Dr. Hung started his independent research at the Institute of Chemistry, Academia Sinica in 1998 and moved to the Department of Chemistry, National Tsing Hua University in 2005. In 2009, he moved back Taipei and joined the Genomics Research Center (GRC), Academia Sinica, where he was promoted as the Distinguished Professor in 2012 and served as the Director of GRC during 2016-2022. Dr. Hung received several awards from the National Science and Technology Council, the Ministry of Education, and some Foundations. Very recently, he was elected as the Academician of Academia Sinica in July, 2024. Dr. Hung’s research interest aims on the development of new strategies to synthesize cell-surface complex carbohydrates (e.g. glycosaminoglycans and sialo-sugars) to probe their specific interactions with disease-related proteins.