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2
The Landscape of Current
Research in Glycoscience
As a starting point to inform its deliberations, the committee sought
to better understand the current landscape of major U.S. and international
glycoscience efforts. This chapter presents a brief overview of the commit-
tee's findings in order to provide a baseline of current investments in the
field and a sense of centers of research activity in the United States and
abroad. Examples and further details on U.S. and international glycosci-
ence programs are included in Appendix B.
Although it did not undertake an exhaustive survey to identify U.S.
and international glycoscience efforts, the committee reviewed infor-
mation provided to it by federal sponsors,1 received community input
through its website and through a workshop held in January 2012,2
gained additional perspectives through further data-gathering efforts,3
1 Representatives of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), Food and Drug Administration
(FDA), U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), and National Science Foundation (NSF) briefed
the committee on their motivations in sponsoring the study and their views on challenges
and opportunities for glycoscience at the committee's first meeting on October 10, 2011.
2 For the workshop's agenda and participants, see Appendix B. Information on the study's
website (http://glyco.nas.edu) and the questions that members of the community were
invited to address can be found in Appendix C.
3 Committee members spoke with several additional scientists to gather information
on current glycoscience research outside the United States; information can be found in
Appendix C.
29
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30 TRANSFORMING GLYCOSCIENCE
conducted a Web of Science review of published literature,4 and drew on
a background paper prepared by the National Research Council (NRC)
that summarizes a range of federal agency and researcher viewpoints on
the field (McGowan and Bowman 2010).5 These materials provided an
overview of the current landscape of glycoscience research efforts and
informed development of the committee's roadmap.
2.1 AN OVERVIEW OF GLYCOSCIENCE WORLDWIDE
Glycoscience research is conducted worldwide in projects that cut
across multiple disciplines. As can be seen from Figures 2-1 and 2-2, active
glycoscience research is ongoing not only in North America (the United
States and Canada) but also in Asia (People's Republic of China, Taiwan,
Japan, South Korea, India--and Australia), in many countries in Europe,
and in Latin America (Brazil).
A number of U.S. federal agencies support or conduct glycoscience
research, including NIH (through multiple individual institutes), NSF,
DOE, FDA, U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), and National Insti-
tute of Standards and Technology (NIST). These agencies have comple-
mentary interests in the field, including the application of glycoscience for
human health and in support of therapeutic drug and vaccine develop-
ment (NIH, FDA, NIST), the application of glycoscience to plant biology
(DOE, USDA), and advancing basic science understanding and funda-
mental tool development for the field (NSF, NIST, NIH, and others).
Additional details and further examples are provided in Appendix B,
but one notable federally funded initiative is the Consortium for Func-
tional Glycomics, which currently receives legacy funding from NIH and
involves the participation of hundreds of researchers worldwide. The
efforts of participating research groups have made available a range of
resources for addressing questions in glycoscience and health, including
4 A search of the Web of Science (WOS) Citation Index Expanded Database was conducted
on May 15, 2012, using the following parameters: Topic: glycoscience* OR glycan* OR
carbohydrate* OR *cellulos* OR glycobiolog* OR *saccharide*; years: 2005-2012; publication
type: articles, meeting abstracts, and proceedings. The search produced 127,602 results.
5 The background paper was prepared at the request of NIH, which asked the NRC
to reach out to researchers and federal program managers for their views on the state of
glycomics and glycoscience and challenges facing the field, in order to better understand
how to frame the design of the current study. The paper summarizes information received
during this outreach, in which NRC staff and a small group of glycoscience experts spoke
with approximately 40 scientists and program managers from government, academia, and
industry. The paper was not reviewed per the NRC's report review procedures and does
not necessarily reflect the views of the NRC or its boards. The information it contained did
help provide background material for the current study, particularly on the landscape of
U.S. research efforts.
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THE LANDSCAPE OF CURRENT RESEARCH IN GLYCOSCIENCE 31
Biochemistry Molecular Biology (14.5%)
Energy Fuels (2.2%) Biotechnology Applied Microbiology (8.4%)
Endocrinology Metabolism (2.3%) Chemistry Organic (6.5%)
Chemistry Medicinal (2.5%) Chemistry Multidisciplinary (6.4%)
Biochemical Research Methods (2.7%) Pharmacology Pharmacy (6.3%)
Cell Biology (3.2%) Immunology (6.3%)
Chemistry Physical (3.2%) Food Science Technology (6.2%)
Chemistry Analytical (3.4%) Chemistry Applied (6.1%)
Engineering Chemical (3.5%) Polymer Science (6.1%)
Nutrition Dietetics (3.6%) Microbiology (5.7%)
Plant Sciences (4.0%)
FIGURE 2-1 Glycoscience research spans a diversity of fields, as indicated by the
Web of Science subject categories associated with published research. Results from
the WOS citation search described above were sorted by WOS subject category,
and the top 20 subject areas are depicted above.
Figure 2-1
resources for glycomics profiling, carbohydrate compounds and reagents,
microarray analysis, mouse phenotyping, glycan array screening, and
glycan databases.
Similarly, a number of U.S. research programs and clusters of research
expertise were identified during the committee's data-gathering process.
These span the country and may involve multiple researchers, provid-
ing a concentration of expertise across different aspects of glycoscience.
Although many more examples are provided in Appendix B, one example
of a center of excellence for glycoscience research in the United States is
the Complex Carbohydrate Research Center (CCRC), located at the Uni-
versity of Georgia. The CCRC includes a cluster of centers that address
plant, microbial, and human carbohydrates, along with research resources
in areas such as nuclear magnetic resonance analysis and computational
modeling.
Glycoscience research is also conducted across the globe in projects that
cut across disciplines. Although not described here, examples of research
activities and investments from Canada, the United Kingdom, Germany,
Japan, China, Taiwan, Australia, New Zealand, and Brazil are provided
in the appendix. Glycoscience also has significant relevance to companies
invested in the development of protein-based biotherapeutics or vaccines
containing carbohydrate antigens (discussed in Chapter 3). Other compa-
nies interested in glycoscience include those that use carbohydrate-based
materials for drug delivery and tissue engineering applications, those
interested in the development of cellulose-based biofuels and products
derived from agricultural sources and by custom chemical producers.
Representative examples are provided in Appendix B.
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Canada
Japan
South Korea USA
PR China
Taiwan
India
Germany UK France Spain Brazil
Italy Netherlands Sweden Russia Australia
Poland Switzerland Belgium Denmark
Finland Turkey Austria Portugal
FIGURE 2-2 Glycoscience research occurs worldwide, with centers of activity around the globe. Results from the WOS citation
search described above were sorted by country of author, with the top 25 countries depicted in the figure. The size of the bubbles
represents the relative proportion of glycoscience papers published. Underlying world map adapted from David Niblack. Found
32
at: http://imagebase.davidniblack.com.
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THE LANDSCAPE OF CURRENT RESEARCH IN GLYCOSCIENCE 33
In addition to the many programs and collaborations identified by the
committee, several scientific forums bring together members of the gly-
coscience community both in the United States and internationally. These
include scientific meetings such as the annual Society for Glycobiology
conferences; biennial Gordon Research Conferences on Glycobiology, on
Glycolipid and Sphingolipid Biology, and on Plant Cell Walls; the biennial
international carbohydrate symposium organized by the International
Carbohydrate Organization); and the biennial meeting by the Interna-
tional Glycoconjugate Organization (IGO). The long-standing Annual San
Diego Glycobiology Symposium involves glycoscientists from throughout
California and regularly attracts participants from all over the world.
Other scientific forums include the biennial Charles Warren workshops
on glycoscience characterization and analysis and the Beilstein Symposia
on Glyco-Bioinformatics.
2.2 AN "OMICS" FIELD--GLYCOSCIENCE IN ITS INFANCY
The citation search in the WOS database undertaken by the commit-
tee was intended to be broad so as to include research on cellulose and
other carbohydrate polymers as well as glycoconjugates. By this measure
the number of papers published annually in the overarching field of gly-
coscience is similar to those published in genomics or proteomics alone6
(see Figure 2-3). Glycomics,7 however, clearly remains in its infancy,
with annual publications several orders of magnitude lower. When the
Human Genome Project was initiated in 1990, genomics publications also
were substantially lower in number than they are today.8 Over the ensu-
ing decades a massive expansion of gene-sequencing capabilities and a
decrease in costs have occurred (see Figure 2-4). Enabling genome analy-
sis to advance to its current state required integrated efforts across the
scientific community, including both international collaborations (such
6 A WOS search was conducted on May 15, 2012, using the following parameters: (A)
A "Glyco (all terms)" search was conducted as identified above, except that Years: 1995-
2011, producing 253,658 total results. (B) Topic: genom*; Citation database: Citation Index
Expanded; Years: 1995-2011; Publication type: article, meeting abstract, and proceeding,
producing 285,067 total results. (C) Topic: glycom*; Citation database: Citation Index
Expanded; Years: 1995-2011; Publication type: article, meeting abstract, and proceeding,
producing 1,624 total results. (D) Topic: proteom*; Citation database: Citation Index
Expanded; Years: 1995-2011; Publication type: article, meeting abstract, and proceeding,
producing 45,370 total results.
7 Analogous to genomics (the study of the full set of nucleic acid genetic material) and
proteomics (the study of the full set of proteins), glycomics involves comprehensive study
of the full set of glycans present in a cell or an organism.
8 A WOS search for the term "genom*" similar to that described above produced 5,700
results for the year 1990.
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34 TRANSFORMING GLYCOSCIENCE
100,000
Number of Publications (Log Scale)
10,000
1,000 Genom*
Glycom*
100 Glyco (all terms)
Proteom*
10
1
95
97
99
01
03
05
07
09
11
19
19
19
20
20
20
20
20
20
Year
FIGURE 2-3 Comparison of WOS search results for annual genomics, proteomics,
glycomics, and glycoscience research.
Figure 2-3
as the Human Genome Organization, HUGO), and the contributions of
many individual scientists. It is beyond the committee's charge to propose
a similar formal glycoscience initiative comparable to that of the Human
Genome Project or the National Nanotechnology Initiative. Rather, the
committee seeks to describe the current status of the field of glycoscience
and explore its potential, while clearly recognizing that advancing the
field in a similar dramatic fashion, as with genetics and genomics, would
require engagement by and the efforts of multiple stakeholders beyond
the current community of glycoscience specialists.
2.3 COMMON CONCERNS AMONG U.S. AND
INTERNATIONAL GLYCOSCIENTISTS
During its data-gathering efforts, the committee did not observe sig-
nificant differences among the viewpoints shared by U.S. and interna-
tional researchers. Although individual scientists might vary in the chal-
lenges or opportunities they choose to highlight, several common themes
emerged as being of fundamental importance to the field. Many of the
technical challenges that make up the core toolkit to enable the next gener-
ation of glycoscience discoveries are addressed later in this report and are
reflected in the committee's recommendations for a roadmap to advance
the field. This section focuses on several other significant messages:
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THE LANDSCAPE OF CURRENT RESEARCH IN GLYCOSCIENCE 35
FIGURE 2-4 The rapid decline in the cost of sequencing a human genome.
SOURCE: Wetterstrand 2012; Image courtesy of The National Human Genome
Project. Found at: genome.gov/sequencingcosts.
Figure 2-4
Bitmapped
· Visibility and vision of the field: Both U.S. and international glyco-
scientists noted that relevant work taking place in a variety of
disciplines may not be labeled with the term "glycobiology" and
thus may not be well recognized as falling under the glycoscience
umbrella. The field would benefit from having a clear picture
to present to nonexperts, as well as compelling goals behind
which the community could rally. Because glycoscience provides
a level of data that can build from and complement genomic and
proteomic information, inclusion of glycoscience components in
international Human Genome Organization (HUGO) and Human
Proteome Organization (HUPO) projects could help draw out
these connections.9
9 One example is the Human Disease Glycomics/Proteome Initiative (HGPI) through
HUPO. HGPI investigates glycosylation changes in efforts to identify possible biomarkers
relevant to the diagnosis or progression of disease (see http://www.hupo.org/research/
hgpi/).
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36 TRANSFORMING GLYCOSCIENCE
· Education and awareness: Both students and peer researchers who
are not experts in glycoscience lack an understanding of why gly-
coscience is significant, they lack a comprehensive view of what
the glycoscience field encompasses, and they do not see how
glycoscience relates to their own interests. Researchers expressed
concerns about the limited coverage of carbohydrates in academic
programs when compared to classes of molecules such as nucleic
acids and proteins and about how the field suffers from a percep-
tion that it is too complex to study effectively or is not exciting.
· Critical role of collaborative approaches: Many glycoscience chal-
lenges are likely to benefit from synergistic efforts that bring
communities of people together to address problems from differ-
ent perspectives. As the field seeks to advance to the next level
of discoveries, there will be a need to foster collaboration and
understanding between, for example, clinicians and laboratory
researchers, between biologists and chemists, and between com-
putational/informatics experts and experimental scientists.
2.4CONCLUSION
The landscape of glycoscience research provides a picture of a global
field with a range of ongoing research efforts, both academic and commer-
cial, and one for which the community sees significant opportunities as
well as common challenges. The following chapters of this report attempt
to present a holistic view of glycoscience's contributions to critical areas
such as human health, energy, and materials science; to bring new atten-
tion from both experts and nonexperts to the field; and to point the way
toward a roadmap and a vision for the future of the field.
