Carbohydrates biochemistry

E. J. Hehre, Glycosyl transfer A history of the concept s development and view of its major contributions to biochemistry, Carbohydr. Res., 331 (2001) 347-368. 

Percival E (1963) The monodsaccharides. In Florkin M, Stotz EH (eds) Comprehensive biochemistry Carbohydrates Vol 5. Elsevier Amsterdam, 1... 

Hassid s many contributions on the structure and synthesis of plant carbohydrates were recognized by a number of honors and awards. He received the first Sugar Research Award (1945) of the National Academy of Sciences (jointly with M. Doudoroff and H. A. Barker), the Charles Reid Barnes Honorary Life Membership Award of the American Society of Plant Physiologists (1964), and the C. S. Hudson Award of the Division of Carbohydrate Chemistry of the American Chemical Society (1967). He was elected to membership in the National Academy of Sciences (1958) and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (1969), and he was honored at the 6th International Symposium on Carbohydrate Chemistry (1972) as one of three outstanding, senior American carbohydrate chemists. He was elected Chairman of the Division of Carbohydrate Chemistry (1949-1950) of the American Chemical Society, and he served as a member of numerous editorial boards, including those of the Journal of Biological Chemistry, Annual Review of Biochemistry, Carbohydrate Research, Phytochemistry, and Analytical Biochemistry. 

Morrison, W.R. Karkalas, J. Starch. Methods in Plant Biochemistry Carbohydrates-, Academic Press London, U.K., 1990 p. 323. 

Lezica, R. P. Quesada-AUue, L. (1990). Chitin. In J. B. Harbourne (Ed.) Methods in Plant Biochemistry.Carbohydrates. Vol2. (443-481). New York Academic Press. 

Yu Z W, Calvert T L and Leckband D 1998 Molecular forces between membranes displaying neutral glycosphingolipids evidence for carbohydrate attraction Biochemistry 37 1540-50... 

Biochemistry resulted from the early elucidation of the pathway of enzymatic conversion of glucose to ethanol by yeasts and its relation to carbohydrate metaboHsm in animals. The word enzyme means "in yeast," and the earfler word ferment has an obvious connection. Partly because of the importance of wine and related products and partly because yeasts are relatively easily studied, yeasts and fermentation were important in early scientific development and stiU figure widely in studies of biochemical mechanisms, genetic control, cell characteristics, etc. Fermentation yeast was the first eukaryote to have its genome elucidated. 

A quote from a biochemistry text is instructive here. "This is not an easy reaction in organic chemistry. It is, however, a very important type of reaction in metabolic chemistry and is an integral step in the oxidation of carbohydrates, fats, and several amino acids." G. L. Zubay, Biochemistry, 4th ed., William C. Brown Publishers, 1996, p. 333. 

Lasky, L. A., 1995. Selectin-carbohydrate interactions and the initiation of die inflammatory response. Annual Review of Biochemistry 64 113-139. 

Biochemistry is carbonyl chemistiy. Almost all metabolic pathways used by living organisms involve one or more of the four fundamental carbonvl-group reactions we ve seen in Chapters 19 through 23. The digestion and metabolic breakdown of all the major classes of food molecules—fats, carbohydrates, and proteins—take place by nucleophilic addition reactions, nucleophilic acyl substitutions, a substitutions, and carbonyl condensations. Similarly, hormones and other crucial biological molecules are built up from smaller precursors by these same carbonyl-group reactions. 

Because sugars are involved in most of the mechanisms established for the synthesis of these heterocycles, the development of carbohydrate chemistry has been most helpful in these researches—especially for the preparation of specifically labeled molecules. Conversely, the contribution of these efforts to carbohydrate chemistry and biochemistry has shown the involvement in biosynthesis of 1 -deoxy-D-f/rreo-pentulose—scarcely before recognized and considered a rare sugar—and of fully functionalized pentuloses of still unknown configuration (or their phosphates). Finally, evidence has been found in prokaryotes for a most extraordinary transformation of 5-amino-l-(P-D-ribofuranosyl)imidazole 5 -phos-phate into a pyrimidine. Surely, this transformation should be explained in terms... 

Since the early 1970s a panel convened by the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry and the International Union of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology has been working to formulate recommendations for carbohydrate nomenclature that meet developing needs of research and electronic data handling, while retaining links to the established literature base on carbohydrates. The realization of these endeavors is presented here in the final document Nomenclature of Carbohydrates, which provides a definitive reference for current researchers, both in the text version and in the version accessible on the World Wide Web (http //www.chem.qmw.ac.uk/iupac/2carb/), where amendments and revisions are maintained. 

Pectins can generally be divided into neutral and acidic polymers, but certain structural features are common between the different types of pectic substances. These will be described below. Concerning the general chemistry of carbohydrate types of linkages, the reader can find details on this in general textbooks of chemistry and biochemistry and is for this reason not included. 

Because of its importance to carbohydrate technology, biochemistry, and physical organic chemistry, the hydrolytic cleavage of glycosides has been extensively studied with respect to both acid and enzymic catalysis. Reviews on the acid-catalyzed hydrolysis have been presented by BeMiller, Capon, ... 

Glucose is the most important carbohydrate in mammalian biochemistry because nearly all carbohydrate in food is converted to glucose for metabohsm. 

---