Analysis of Carbohydrates by Nuclear Magnetic Resonance Spectroscopy

NMR spectroscopy has shown to be extremely useful for the characterization of glycan structures. Carbohydrates have two natural NMR-active nuclei: 1H and 13C. This chapter describes the identification of monosaccharides and glycans by the assignment of their protons and carbons, using the structural-reporter group concept and 2D NMR techniques, which additionally provide linkage and sequence information. All this is illustrated by some NMR spectra of glycans and polysaccharides and the NMR measuring procedure is summarized.