Method for producing sialic-acid-containing sugar chain

Abstract

[Problem to be Solved] The importance of sugar chains having α2,3- or α2,6-linked sialic acid at their non-reducing ends is known. Industrial production has been demanded for these sugar chain compounds. Particularly, the production of glycoprotein drugs or the like inevitably requires producing in quantity sugar chains having homogeneous structures by controlling the linking pattern (α2,6-linkage or α2,3-linkage) of sialic acid. Particularly, a triantennary or tetraantennary N-type complex sugar chain having sialic acid at each of all non-reducing ends is generally considered difficult to chemically synthesize. There has been no report disclosing that such a sugar chain was chemically synthesized. Furthermore, these sugar chains are also difficult to efficiently prepare enzymatically. [Solution] The present inventors have newly found the activity of sialyltransferase of degrading sialic acid on a reaction product in the presence of CMP and also found that formed CMP can be degraded enzymatically to thereby efficiently produce a sialic acid-containing sugar chain. The present inventors have further found that even a tetraantennary N-type sugar chain having four α2,6-linked sialic acid molecules, which has previously been difficult to synthesize, can be prepared at high yields by one-pot synthesis comprising the elongation reaction of a biantennary sugar chain used as a starting material without performing purification after each enzymatic reaction.