AVIÑÓ , Anna

Protein–carbohydrate recognition is of fundamental importance for a large number of biological processes; carbohydrate–aromatic stacking is a widespread, but poorly understood, structural motif in this recognition. We describe, for the first time, the measurement of carbohydrate–aromatic interactions from their contribution to the stability of...

Mono- and disaccharides have been shown to stack on top of DNA duplexes stabilizing sequences with terminal C–G base pairs. Here we present an apolar version of glucose and cellobiose as new capping agents that stack on DNA increasing considerably its stability with respect to their natural polyhydroxylated mono- and disaccharide DNA conjugates.

Quadruplex DNA structures are attracting an enormous interest in many areas of chemistry, ranging from chemical biology, supramolecular chemistry to nanoscience. We have prepared carbohydrate-DNA conjugates containing the oligonucleotide sequences of G-quadruplexes (thrombin binding aptamer (TBA) and human telomere (TEL)), measured their...

Carbohydrate-nucleic acid contacts are known to be a fundamental part of some drug-DNA recognition processes. Most of these interactions occur through the minor groove of DNA, such as in the calicheamicin or anthracycline families, or through both minor and major groove binders such as in the pluramycins. Here, we demonstrate that...

Oligoribonucleotide conjugates and the corresponding siRNA duplexes against tumor necrosis factor carrying one, two, or four glucose and galactose residues at the 5'-end have been prepared using phosphoramidite chemistry. Carbohydrate-modified siRNA duplexes have similar inhibitory properties than unmodified RNA duplexes in HeLa cells...

Pneumocystis pneumonia (PcP) is a disease produced by the opportunistic infection of the fungus Pneumocystis jirovecii. As delayed or unsuitable treatments increase the risk of mortality, the development of rapid and accurate diagnostic tools for PcP are of great importance. Unfortunately, current standard methods present severe limitations and...

Oligonucleotide conjugates carrying carbohydrates at the 5′-end have been prepared. Glucose, fucose, and saccharides containing glucose at the nonreducing end were attached to DNA strands using the classical phosphoramidite chemistry. Two types of spacers and a dendron scaffold helped to obtain a diversity of sugar presentations in the DNA...

Pneumocystis jirovecii is a fungus responsible for human Pneumocystis pneumonia, one of the most severe infections encountered in immunodepressed individuals. The diagnosis of Pneumocystis pneumonia continues to be challenging due to the absence of specific symptoms in infected patients. Moreover, the standard diagnostic method employed for...

Noncovalent forces rule the interactions between biomolecules. Inspired by a biomolecular interaction found in aminoglycoside–RNA recognition, glucose-nucleobase pairs have been examined. Deoxyoligonucleotides with a 6-deoxyglucose insertion are able to hybridize with their complementary strand, thus exhibiting a preference for purine...

Carbohydrate–aromatic interactions are highly relevant for many biological processes. Nevertheless, experimental data in aqueous solution relating structure and energetics for sugar–arene stacking interactions are very scarce. Here, we evaluate how structural variations in a monosaccharide including carboxyl, N-acetyl, fluorine, and methyl...

Recently, we studied glucose-nucleobase pairs, a binding motif found in aminoglycoside-RNA recognition. DNA duplexes with glucose as a nucleobase were able to hybridize and were selective for purines. They were less stable than natural DNA but still fit well on regular B-DNA. These results opened up the possible use of glucose as a non-aromatic...