Kuberan Balagurunathan
Assistant Professor of Medicinal Chemistry
B.S. St. Joseph College, India
Ph.D. University of Iowa
Kuby Balagurunathan's PubMed Literature Search
Research
Carbohydrates differ from other biological polymers, such as nucleic acids and proteins, in many ways. Most importantly, they have different functional groups that provide almost unlimited variations in their structures. Carbohydrates that are conjugated to proteins or lipids are termed glycoconjugates. They decorate the outer surface of mammalian cells. Their strategic location enables them to regulate many important biological processes, including fertilization, cell growth, cell-cell adhesion, cell-cell communication, development, immune defense, viral and parasitic infection, degradation of blood clots, inflammation etc. Furthermore, alterations in the synthesis or catabolism of cell-surface carbohydrates are associated with various pathological conditions, including malignant transformations and congenital and neurological disorders. Deciphering the enigmatic structures of carbohydrates and understanding their biosynthetic/catabolic pathways are critical for the development of carbohydrate-based therapeutics. In our lab, we are developing new tools to synthesize and characterize heparan sulfate structures (a special class of carbohydrate polymers) with a final goal to understand their biosynthetic and catabolic pathways, and their role in various physiological processes (axon guidance, regeneration, and learning and memory) and in human diseases (cancer, congenital defects, thrombosis, brain disease and Sanfilippo disease).
References
1. Garud DR*, Tran VM*, Victor XV, Koketsu M, Kuberan B (2008) Inhibition of Heparan Sulfate and Chondroitin Sulfate Proteoglycan Biosynthesis. Journal of Biological Chemistry 283:28881-28887 [*authors contributed equally]
2. Kuberan B, Ethirajan M, Victor XV, Tran VM, Nguyen KV, Do A (2008) “Click”- Xylosides Initiate Glycosaminoglycan Biosynthesis in a Mammalian Cell line. ChemBioChem 9:198–200
3. Sugumaran G, Elliott-Bryant R, Phung N, Vitseva O, Lech M, Kuberan B (2004) Splenic Proteoglycans of Amyloid-Susceptible and Amyloid-Resistant Mice. 1. Quantitation and Characterization of Glycosaminoglycans Accumulated In Vivo after Induction for Amyloid Formation. Scandanavian Journal of Immunology, In Press
4. Kuberan B, Lech M, Borjigin J, Rosenberg RD (2004) Light Induced 3-O-Sulfotransferase Expression Alters Pineal Heparan Sulfate Fine Structure: A Surprising Link to Circadian Rhythm. Journal of Biological Chemistry 279(7)5053-5054
5. Lawrence R, Kuberan B, Lech M, Beeler DL, Rosenberg RD (2004) Mapping Critical Biological Motifs and Biosynthetic Pathways of Heparan Sulfate. Glycobiology, 14(5)467-479
6. Kuberan B, Beeler DL, Lawrence R, Lech M, Rosenberg RD (2003) Rapid Two Step Synthesis of Mitrin from Heparosan: A Replacement for Heparin. Journal of the American Chemical Society 125(41)12424-12425
7. Kuberan B, Beeler DL, Lech M, Wu ZL, Rosenberg
RD (2003) Enzymatic Synthesis of Antithrombin III Binding Heparan
Sulfate Pentasaccharide. Nature Biotechnology 21(11)1343-1346
8. Kuberan B, Beeler DL, Lech M, Wu ZL, Rosenberg RD (2003) Chemoenzymatic
Synthesis of Classical and Non-classical Anticoagulant Heparan
Sulfate Polysaccharides. Journal of Biological Chemistry 278(52)52613-52621
9. Wu Zhengliang L, Zhang Lijuan, Yabe Tomio, Kuberan B, Beeler
DL, Love A, Rosenberg RD (2003) The Involvement of Heparan Sulfate
in FGF1/FGFR1 Signaling Complex. Journal of Biological Chemistry
278(19)17121-17129
10. Kuberan B, Lech M, Zhang L, Wu ZL, Beeler DL, Rosenberg RD
(2002) Analysis of Heparan Sulfate Oligosaccharides with Ion Pair-Reverse
Phase Capillary High Performance Liquid Chromatography-Micro Electrospray
Ionization Time-of-Flight Mass Spectrometry. Journal of the American
Chemical Society 124(29)8707-8718
