Issue 3, 2021

Introducing affinity and selectivity into galectin-targeting nanoparticles with fluorinated glycan ligands

Abstract

Galectins are potential biomarkers and therapeutic targets. However, galectins display broad affinity towards β-galactosides meaning glycan-based (nano)biosensors lack the required selectivity and affinity. Using a polymer-stabilized nanoparticle biosensing platform, we herein demonstrate that the specificity of immobilised lacto-N-biose towards galectins can be ‘turned on/off’ by using site-specific glycan fluorination and in some cases reversal of specificity can be achieved. The panel of fluoro-glycans were obtained by a chemoenzymatic approach, exploiting BiGalK and BiGalHexNAcP enzymes from Bifidobacterium infantis which are shown to tolerate fluorinated glycans, introducing structural diversity which would be very laborious by chemical methods alone. These results demonstrate that integrating non-natural, fluorinated glycans into nanomaterials can encode unprecedented selectivity with potential applications in biosensing.

Graphical abstract: Introducing affinity and selectivity into galectin-targeting nanoparticles with fluorinated glycan ligands

Supplementary files

Article information

Article type
Edge Article
Submitted
28 Sept. 2020
Accepted
14 Nov. 2020
First published
16 Nov. 2020
This article is Open Access

All publication charges for this article have been paid for by the Royal Society of Chemistry
Creative Commons BY license

Chem. Sci., 2021,12, 905-910

Introducing affinity and selectivity into galectin-targeting nanoparticles with fluorinated glycan ligands

S. Richards, T. Keenan, J. Vendeville, D. E. Wheatley, H. Chidwick, D. Budhadev, C. E. Council, C. S. Webster, H. Ledru, A. N. Baker, M. Walker, M. C. Galan, B. Linclau, M. A. Fascione and M. I. Gibson, Chem. Sci., 2021, 12, 905 DOI: 10.1039/D0SC05360K

This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported Licence. You can use material from this article in other publications without requesting further permissions from the RSC, provided that the correct acknowledgement is given.

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