The Alberta Glycomics Centre

For nearly half a century, Alberta has been a prominent contributor to the study of carbohydrates. Since 1961, when the late Raymond U. Lemieux established a research program at the University of Alberta, researchers in the province have played an international role in the field, making seminal contributions to carbohydrate synthesis, analytical methods, and to our understanding of carbohydrate-protein interactions. In the mid 1980s Ole Hindsgaul joined Professor Lemieux as a faculty member followed a few years later by Monica Palcic. The three invited David Bundle to join them in 1993 with the express intentions of creating a significantly enlarged initiative in carbohydrate chemistry and glycobiology.

Established Upon a Firm Foundation

Building upon Professor Lemieux’s distinguished legacy Bundle, Hindsgaul and Palcic founded the Alberta Innovates Centre for Carbohydrate Science (now the Alberta Glycomics Centre), which began operation in September, 2002, under with a total of six principal investigators from the University of Alberta and the University of Calgary. These talented researchers, joined by several new faculty over the past five years, guide the areas of research. The Glycomics Centre has also established a management advisory board and a scientific advisory board to oversee the management, financial accountability, and scientific progress of the Centre. The direction provided by these investigators and management teams, coupled with the exceptional research infrastructure accessible to the Centre via various departments at the University of Alberta and the University of Calgary, have built the foundation for a dynamic, stimulating environment in which to tackle ambitious, multidisciplinary research problems.

In its short history, the Centre has acquired an impressive list of accomplishments in glycomic research. From determining the structures of medically relevant carbohydrate-binding proteins, to furthering our understanding of multivalent interactions so industriously used by carbohydrate-containing biomolecules, to developing vaccine manufacturing processes, to discovering new carbohydrate entities, the Glycomics Centre has clearly established itself at the vanguard of carbohydrate structure and function. This is further exemplified in the more than 200 publications, several patents and numerous awards and honours presented to the members of the Centre in recognition of their outstanding research achievements. To date, the Centre has trained a total of 60 graduate students and 30 post-doctoral fellows.