Tuning and regulating the repertoire of glycan determinants

Abstract

We apply Tlusty's information-theoretic index theorem analysis of the genetic code to the glycome, using a cognitive paradigm by which external information sources constrain and tune the glycan code error network, in the context of available metabolic energy. The model suggests spontaneous symmetry breaking of the glycan code as a function of metabolic energy intensity, an effect that may be currently present, or embedded in evolutionary trajectory, recording large-scale ecosystem resilience shifts in energy availability such as the aerobic transition. Once focused on a subset of the glycan error code network however, the glycan production machinery must then be regulated by an elaborate cognitive process to ensure that what is produced matches what has been chosen for production. Index theorem methods emerge in a highly natural manner for this composite system whose failures will be represented by a spectrum of glycan disorders.