An Idea to Explore: Analysis of Datasets on Diseases Associated With Protein Glycosylation as a Pedagogical Approach Using Free Software to Teach the Biochemistry of Diseases

Glycosylation is a biologically significant post-translational modification (PTM) of proteins that involves the covalent attachment of a sugar molecule (a glycan) to a peptide sequence, resulting in the formation of glycoproteins. Glycomics and glycoproteomics involve the complete mapping of glycans of a cell, tissue, or organism. Glyco-bioinformatics facilitates the exchange of glyco-specific information among students and researchers using computers. The need for glyco-bioinformatics tools is rapidly increasing because glycoproteins are increasingly attracting clinical attention due to the potential to help in the early diagnosis of diseases. Functional enrichment analysis is used to identify the functions of a set of genes and proteins. This report attempts to illustrate how freely available bioinformatics tools can be used as pedagogical approaches to study or teach protein glycosylation in diseases for biochemistry graduates who are interested in continuing their careers in glycomics and glycoproteomics.