SFG 2025 Annual Meeting Program
Schedule of Events

Session 1: Interdisciplinary Glycoscience
Chair/Moderator: Nichollas Scott, Melbourne University

Keynote Speakers:

Development Of Monoclonal Antibodies Against Bacterial Carbohydrates For Multi-Pathogen Glycoproteomics And Passive Immune Therapies

Sridevi Krishnan, University of Arizona
Multiomic Investigations in Precision Nutrition and Metabolism

Shinya Fushinobu, Tokyo University
Molecular Insights into the Symbiosis between Humans and Bifidobacteria through Specific Glycan Degradation

Morten Thaysen-Andersen, Macquarie University
Systems Glycobiology identifies HEXB as a Tumor-promoting Glyco-enzyme in Colorectal Cancer

Poster Talks:

Victor López, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center
Discovery of the Human Polyisoprenol Salvage Pathway

José Pires, Center for Glycocalyx Research, Institute of Cellular and Molecular Medicine, University of Copenhagen 
Characterization of the Carbohydrate Complexity Along the Gastrointestinal Tract Using Human Derived Organoids of Stomach, Jejunum, and Colon

Ratmir Derda, University of Alberta
Cross-Chiral Recognition between Glycans and Proteins: Insights from Machine Learning, Total Synthesis, and Array Technologies

Yi-Chang Liu, Glycogenetics, Inc.
Establishing a curated human lectin collection for systematic glycoprofiling

Session 2: Tools and Technologies for Applied Glycochemistry
Chair/Moderator: Jennifer Kohler, University of Texas

Keynote Speakers:

Ethan Goddard-Borger, The University of Melbourne
Exploring the Prevalence, Mechanism and Function of Tryptophan C-Mannosylation

Samy Cecioni, Université de Montréal
Fluorogenic Capture of Glycan-Lectin Interactions

Christian Bull, Raddboud University
Genetic and chemical engineering of the human Sialome

Jennifer Kohler, University of Texas
Time-Resolved Tracking of Glycoconjugates with a Mini-Tetrazine N-Acetylglucosamine

Jeffrey Gildersleeve, Center for Cancer Research, National Cancer Institute
New Technologies for Discovering and Evolving Anti-Glycan Monoclonal Antibodies

Mia Huang, The Scripps Research Institute
Mapping glycan-protein interactions in cells

Session 3: Advancements in Medical Glycobiology
Chair/Moderator: Richard Steet, Greenwood Genetic Center

Keynote Speakers:

Adnan Halim, University of Copenhagen
O-mannosylation and POMT1/POMT2 dependency in KIAA1549::BRAF driven gliomas

Joe Contessa, Yale School of Medicine, University & Rutgers Cancer Institute
OST inhibition and Cancer: Mechanistic Underpinnings and Therapeutic Opportunities  

Motoi Kanagawa, Ehime University
Pathomechanism and therapeutic strategy for glycosylation-deficient muscular dystrophies

Hamed Jafar-Nejad, Baylor Collage of Medicine
Therapeutic targeting of POGLUT1 to prevent liver transplantation in Alagille syndrome

Heather Flanagan-Steet, Baylor College of Medicine
The convergence of metabolism and glycosylation in CDG pathogenesis

Kaspar Locher, ETH Zurich
An Enzymatic Pipeline for the Synthesis of High-Mannose N-Glycopeptides

President's Innovator Award Lecture
Dr. Nicolle Packer, Macquarie University

Session 4: Carbohydrate Synthesis
Chair/Moderator: Hiromune Ando, Gifu University

Keynote Speakers:

Hongzhi Cao, School of Medicine and Pharmacy, Ocean University
Chemical Evolution of Enzyme-Catalyzed Glycosylation

Go Hirai, Kyushu University
C-Glycoside-Based Linkage Editing of Glycans: Synthesis and Unlocking New Biological Potential

Koichi Fukase, Osaka University
Glycans and Immunity: A Precision Approach from Synthetic Chemistry

Lina Cui, University of Florida
TBD

Rachel Hevey, University of Basel
Discovery & synthesis of mucosal glycans for attenuating virulence in pathogens

Poster Talk:

Terrell Carter, University of Georgia
Determination of the Enzyme Specificities of the Functional M3 Glycan Biosynthetic Pathway Associated with Dystroglycanopathy

Session 5: Applied informatics and AI
Chair/Moderator: Sriram Neelamegham, SUNY Buffalo

Keynote Speakers:

Masaaki Matsubara, The Noguchi Institute
Detecting Glycan‑Like Regions in Complex Molecules

Evan Bolton, Chemistry Group, National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI)
PubChem: towards the integration of glycoscience data

Yoshiki Yamaguchi, Tohoku Medical and Pharmaceutical University
Structure-Based Prediction of Pathogenic Glycogene Variants Using VarMeter2

Sriram Neelamegham, SUNY Buffalo
Multi-level regulation of glycosylation

Jon Agirre, Department of Chemistry, University of York
Making the most of 3D structures of glycoproteins and protein-carbohydrate complexes

Poster Talks:

Cyrus Chun Hong Au Yeung, The George Washington University
A Graph-Based AI Workflow for Mining Glycan Biomarkers and Related Annotations from Publications

Chin Huang, University of Georgia
Modeling glycans with AlphaFold 3: capabilities, caveats, and limitations

Session 6: Plants, Polysaccharides and their Applications
Chair/Moderator: Breeanna Urbanowitz, University of Georgia

Keynote Speakers:

Takeshi Ishimizu, Ritsumeikan University
Apiosyltransferases involved in the biosynthesis of pectin and apiin

Baocai Zhang, Institute of Genetics and Developmental Biology, Chinese Academy of Sciences
Xylan Biosynthesis Governs Cell Wall Shaping and Functions in Grasses

Breeanna Urbanowitz, University of Georgia
TBD

Michelle O’Malley, UC Santa Barbara
Building a Biofoundry for Extreme Microorganisms

Poster Talks:

Xu Yang, University of Georgia
Dry Lab Oriented Wet Lab Design to Enable Alginate Mannuronic/Guluronic Acid Ratio Quantification by Mass Spectrometry

Lubana Shahin, University of Georgia
Unraveling the Molecular Basis of Substrate Selectivity in Pectin O-acetyltransferases

John Sanford, University of Alabama at Birmingham
Sugar phosphates anchor surface and moonlighting proteins in minimal genome bacteria

Sylvain Lehoux, Lectenz Bio
Homogeneous N-Glycan-based Neoglycoproteins: Novel Standards for Reliable N-Glycosylation Assays

Session 7: Microbes and Viruses
Chair/Moderator: Christine Szymanski, University of Georgia

Keynote Speakers:

Lucy Crouch, University of Birmingham
How Infant-Associated Bifidobacterium species Utilise N-glycans from Breastmilk

Dominique Missiakas, University of Chicago
Mucinases of Pathogenic Bacilli and their Contribution to Anthrax Disease

Camilo Perez, University of Georgia
Mechanistic Basis of Transport In Bacterial Cell Wall Biopolymers Synthesis

Lana Saleh, New England Biolabs
Virus-encoded Glycosyltransferases Hypermodify DNA with Diverse Glycans

Poster Talks:

Tadashi Suzuki, RIKEN
Identification of a new Gene Encoding Dolichol-linked Oligosaccharides: Pyrophosphatase in Yeast

Matthew Griffin, University of California Irvine
Discovering new mechanisms of host immune activation via microbiota polysaccharides

Leandre Glendenning, University of Georgia
Carbohydrate-Mediated Macrophage Tolerization to the GM1 Antigen

Christine Szymanski, University of Georgia
Novel Mechanism for Bacterial Resistance to Human Milk and Viruses

Session 8: Analysis of Proteoglycans and their Functions
Chair/Moderator: Marissa Maciej-Hulme, Oslo Metropolitan University

Keynote Speakers:

Rebekka Wild, CNRS/CEA/Université Grenoble Alpes
The Molecular Blueprint of Human Chondroitin Sulfate Chain Elongation

Liang Wu, Rosalind Franklin Institute
Glycosylation Across Scales - Atomistic and Molecular Studies of HS Biosynthesis

Marissa Maciej-Hulme, Oslo Metropolitan University
Integration of Proteoglycan Glycoproteomics and Gagomics Into Multi-Glycomics Towards Systems Glycobiology

Kan Ding, Shanghai Institute of Materia Medica, Chinese Academy of Science
D-glucuronyl C5-epimerase binds to EGFR to suppress kidney fibrosis

Poster Talks:

Caden Summers, Texas A&M University
Protein O-mannosyltransferases 1 and 2 modify DLAR and affect its function in axon development of sensory and circadian pacemaker neurons in Drosophila

Naomi Hitefield, University of Georgia
Intellectual Disability Causal TPR Domain Variants of O-GlcNAc Transferase Have Reduced Interactions with Components of the SET1/COMPASS Complex

Saumya Digraskar, University of Alabama at Birmingham
Heparan sulfate sulfation is a key driver of a-synuclein pathology progression

Jack Moore, University of Georgia
CRISPR Activation Screens Reveal Syndecan Core Protein-Specific Modulation of Heparan Sulfate Sulfation and Ligand Specificity

Session 9: Glycoimmunology and Application to Vaccine Development
Chair/Moderator: Matthew Macauley, University of Alberta

Keynote Speakers:

Kuo-I Lin, Academia Sinica
Glycans in immune responses: focusing on B cell immunity and glycan vaccine processing

Priya Dipta, IGCORE, Nagoya University
ST6GAL1-mediated sialyl linkage switching in tumor-associated macrophages drives cancer-promoting nanotubes carrying α2,6-sialylation

Xuefei Huang, Michigan State University
Development of Next Generation Carbohydrate Based Vaccines

Brian Cobb, Case Western
Vascular Contributions to IgG Function through Sialylation

Adam Barb, University of Georgia
The impact of N-glycan conformational entropy on the binding affinity of Fcγ receptor IIIa / CD16a

Poster Talks:

Mayank Saraswat, Sanford Burnham Prebys Medical Discovery Institute
Mrc1 (MMR, CD206) Controls the Blood Proteome in Reducing Inflammation, Age-Associated Organ Dysfunction and Mortality in Sepsis

Barnita Haldar, University of Alabama at Birmingham
Role of Sialoglycan-Siglec Axis in Pancreatic Cancer Immune Evasion

Session 10: Analytical Technologies
Chair/Moderator: Morten Thaysen-Andersen, Macquarie University

Keynote Speakers:

Stacy Malaker, Yale University
Pioneering Biomarker Discovery through Exploration of Mucin Glycoproteins

Kelvin Anggara, Max Planck Institute Stuttgart
Toward Single Molecule Sequencing of Glycans and Glycoconjugates by Direct Imaging

Kenichi Suzuki, Gifu University
EGFR Activity Regulation through Glycan-glycan Interactions with Gangliosides: Single-molecule Imaging Study

Richard Drake, Medical University of South Carolina
Spatial N-glycan Mass Spectrometry Imaging: From Single Cell to MRI Scales

Niclas Karlsson, Oslo Metropolitan University
O-Glycomics to Study Microbial Degradation

Poster Talk:

Lauren Pepi, Harvard University
Native Glycan Analysis for the Identification and Relative Quantitation of N-glycans Containing PolyLacNAc Modifications

Glycobiology Significant Achievement Awardee Lecture
Dr. Ryan Flynn, Harvard University

Session 11: Glycan Interactions
Chair/Moderator: Angelina Palma, NOVA University of Lisbon

Keynote Speakers:

Angelina Palma, NOVA University of Lisbon
CBM-guided Decoding of Bacterial mucin O-glycan recognition: Integrating Bioinformatics, Glycan Microarrays and Structure

Hiroaki Tateno, National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST)
Integrated Analysis of Glycomics and Transcriptomics in Single Cells

Bernd Lepenies, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München
Myeloid C-type Lectin Receptors as Targets for Immune Modulation

Ana Arda, CIC bioGUNE
Molecular Recognition Mechanisms Between Galectins and Glycoproteins

Poster Talks:

Sree Hari Seenivasan, University of Georgia
GnT-IVs prefer triantennary β1−6 GlcNAc branched over biantennary glycans, uncovered by sequential in vitro N-glycoprotein enzymatic modifications

Soumi Ghosh, Virginia Polytechnic Institute
Ficolin-based Lectin Probes to Study Host-Virus Glycan Interaction

Feliz Goerdeler, Copenhagen Center for Glycomics
Siglec-7 and -15 recognize repeated clustered sulfo-sialo O-glycan motifs on select O-glycoproteins

Jesús Aguilar Diaz de León, Biosensing Instrument Inc.
Characterizing Binding Affinity, Avidity, and the Influence of Cell Surface N-glycosylation of EGFR, HER2 and HER3 Using Label-Free Surface Plasmon Resonance Microscopy Technology