Carb-38. Use of Symbols for Defining Oligosaccharide Structures

2-Carb-38. Use of symbols for defining oligosaccharide structures 2-Carb-38.1. General considerations 

Oligosaccharide and polysaccharide structures occur not only in free form but often as parts of glycopeptides or glycoproteins [11] or of glycolipids [21]. It can be cumbersome to designate their structures by using the recommendations of 2-Carb-37. The use of three-letter symbols for monosaccharide residues is therefore recommended. With appropriate locants and anomeric descriptors, long sequences can thus be adequately described in abbreviated form. 

Symbols for the common monosaccharide residues and derivatives are listed in Table 2. They are generally derived from the corresponding trivial names. Abbreviations for substituents (see 2-Carb-1.16.2), preceded by locants, follow the monosaccharide abbreviations directly. 

Numbering of monosaccharide units, if desired, should proceed from right to left. 

The recommendations presented here are a modified version of the published 1980 recommendations [6]. 

---