Immobilized wheat germ agglutinin separates small oligosaccharides derived from poly-N-acetyllactosaminoglycans of embryonal carcinoma cells

Abstract

Five pure oligosaccharides derived from poly-N-acetyllactosaminoglycans of teratocarcinoma cells were chromatographed on immobilized wheat germ agglutinin (WGA). Three of them, Galβ1-4GlcNAc, GlcNAcβ1-3Gal, and GlcNAcβ1-3Galβ1-4GlcNAc, revealed only weak binding, but GlcNAcβ1-6Galβ1-4GlcNAc was bound moderately and GlcNAcβ1-6Gal was bound quite strongly. The differences in the binding affinities were large enough to allow chromatographic separation of the five oligosaccharides into three distinct fractions in a small column of WGA–agarose.