BACKGROUND Head and neck neoplasia is a major form of cancer in India, accounting for 30% of all cancers which occur in males and 11% of cancers which occur in females. Elevated serum L-fucose glycoprotein levels have been reported to be associated with neoplastic conditions involving various sites. Therefore, monitoring serum/tissue L-fucose glycoprotein levels could be a promising approach fo...

Lewis X (Le(x))-containing glycans play important roles in numerous cellular processes. However, the absence of robust, facile, and cost-effective methods for the synthesis of Le(x) and its structurally related analogs has severely hampered the elucidation of the specific functions of these glycan epitopes. Here we demonstrate that chemically defined guanidine 5'-diphosphate-beta-l-fucose (GDP-...

The 6-deoxyhexose, L-fucose, has a wide distribution in nature as a component of bacterial, plant, and animal polysaccharides or oligosaccharides. Its configuration, which is the same as Lgalactose, suggested to earlier workers that it might be formed biosynthetically from n-galactose by reduction of C-l to a methyl group and oxidation of C-6 to an aldehyde. This suggestion was rendered untenab...

GDP-L-fucose is the activated nucleotide sugar form of L-fucose, which is a constituent of many structural polysaccharides and glycoproteins in various organisms. The de novo synthesis of GDP-L-fucose from GDP-D-mannose encompasses three catalytic steps, a 4,6-dehydration, a 3,5-epimerization, and a 4-reduction. The mur1 mutant of Arabidopsis is deficient in L-fucose in the shoot and is rescued...

alpha-L-fucose abolishes the activity of guinea pig migration inhibitory factor (MIF) on the macrophages. Other sugars such as alpha-D-glucose, beta-D-galactose, alpha-L-rhamnose, methyl-alpha-D-mannoside, and N-acetyl-beta-D-glucosamine had no effect. Theabolition of MIF activity by alpha-L-fucose was reversible. When macrophages were incubated with alpha-L-fucosidase, a glycosidase which spli...

Breast cancer cells incorporate the simple sugar alpha-L-fucose (fucose) into glycoproteins and glycolipids which, in turn, are expressed as part of the malignant phenotype. We have noted that fucose is not simply a bystander molecule, but, in fact, contributes to many of the fundamental oncologic properties of breast cancer cells. Here, we summarize the evidence from us and others that fucose ...

Owing to its aggressiveness and the lack of effective therapies, pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma has a dismal prognosis. New strategies to improve treatment and survival are therefore urgently required. Numerous fucosylated antigens in sera serve as tumor markers for cancer detection and evaluation of treatment efficacy. Increased expression of fucosyltransferases has also been reported for pa...

Leukocyte adhesion deficiency type 2 (LADII) is characterized by defective selectin ligand formation, recurrent infection, and mental retardation. This rare syndrome has only been described in 2 kindreds of Middle Eastern descent who have differentially responded to exogenous fucose treatment. The molecular defect was recently ascribed to single and distinct missense mutations in a putative Gol...

ADAMTS13 is a plasma metalloproteinase that cleaves von Willebrand factor to smaller, less thrombogenic forms. Deficiency of ADAMTS13 activity in plasma leads to thrombotic thrombocytopenic purpura. ADAMTS13 contains eight thrombospondin type 1 repeats (TSR), seven of which contain a consensus sequence for the direct addition of fucose to the hydroxyl group of serine or threonine. Mass spectral...

The Streptococcus pneumoniae fucose utilization operon includes a gene encoding a virulence factor that belongs to family 98 in the glycoside hydrolase classification. This protein contains a C-terminal triplet of fucose binding modules that have significant amino acid sequence identity with the Anguilla anguilla fucolectin. Functional studies of these fucose binding modules reveal binding to f...