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Understanding Glycomechanics Using Mathematical Modeling: A Review of Current Approaches to Simulate Cellular Glycosylation Reaction Networks

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Abstract

Following the footsteps of genomics and proteomics, recent years have witnessed the growth of large-scale experimental methods in the field of glycomics. In parallel, there has also been growing interest in developing Systems Biology based methods to study the glycome. The combined goals of these endeavors is to identify glycosylation-dependent mechanisms regulating human physiology, check points that can control the progression of pathophysiology, and modifications to reaction pathways that can result in more uniform biopharmaceutical processes. In these efforts, mathematical models of N- and O-linked glycosylation have emerged as paradigms for the field. While these are relatively few in number, nevertheless, the existing models provide a basic framework that can be used to develop more sophisticated analysis strategies for glycosylation in the future. The current review surveys these computational models with focus on the underlying mathematics and assumptions, and with respect to their ability to generate experimentally testable hypotheses.

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Acknowledgment

This study is supported by NIH grants HL103411 and HL107146, and NYSTEM contract C024282.

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  1. Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering, and The New York State Center for Excellence in Bioinformatics and Life Sciences, State University of New York, 906 Furnas Hall, Buffalo, NY, 14260, USA

    Apurv Puri & Sriram Neelamegham

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Correspondence to Sriram Neelamegham.

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Associate Editor Scott I. Simon oversaw the review of this article.

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Puri, A., Neelamegham, S. Understanding Glycomechanics Using Mathematical Modeling: A Review of Current Approaches to Simulate Cellular Glycosylation Reaction Networks. Ann Biomed Eng 40, 816–827 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10439-011-0464-5

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