Essentials of Glycobiology—Part 3 (All Living Cells)

Larry A. Law

The National Academy of Science stated that "every living cell on the planet is covered with a dense and complex array of glycans." This array of sugars is called the glycocalyx in humans. It also represents the cell wall in plants. Humans have somewhere around 200 different types of cells classified into four tissue types: epithelial (internal surface linings), muscle, nerve, and connective. Each type of cell has a different structure, size, shape, function, and organelles (factories within). Scientists currently estimate there are 37 trillion cells constituting the adult male, human body. Each one of these cells had a shroud or beard of sugars covering its surface. And it isn't just human cells. Every cell in every animal has sugars covering their surface. Every plant on planet earth has cell walls comprised of sugars on their surface. Humans have 39 trillion microbes (bacteria) within their body. That quantity is more than the number of cells that make up our body. That means, we are more bacteria (by number) than we are human cells! Fortunately, bacteria are a lot smaller so you don't see them very easily. 

Viruses

If speaking of bacterial microbes sounds somewhat disgusting, wait till you hear about the number of viruses in your body! Biologists currently estimate that the human body contains 380 trillion viruses, which is ten times the number of bacteria! The collection of viruses is known as the human virome and can be found in every tissue of the body, including the blood and brain, and is even woven into the genetic code of cells. Viruses are all around us. Every day we breathe in over 100,000,000 (yes—100 million per day)! Most of these are harmless, but some can make us sick especially if our immune system is compromised. The viruses are so small that no mask can stop them. Masks only stop surgeons from spitting germs into open wounds of patients on the operating table. Respiratory viruses cannot be stopped.

In the COVID-19 pandemic it was the elderly and individuals with compromised immune systems that died. Children and the younger generations (less than 60 years of age) were virtually immune to it. Even though it was a gain-of-function virus engineered in a bioweapons laboratory in Wuhan, China, less than 1% of the U.S. population succumbed. But scare tactics were used to take control of democracies and eliminate personal liberty. The medical community created a fake pandemic so the pharmaceutical industry could fill their coffers with a vaccine that proved totally ineffective at stopping infection and transmission of the virus. The experimental gene therapy actully harmed and killed thousands of innocent people who could have been saved with early treatment utilizing safe therapeutics like ivermectin and hydroxychloroquine.

During COVID-19, the public learned more than they wanted to know about the spike protein on the engineered COVID-19 virus. The spike protein is actually a glycoprotein that attaches to an ACE receptor (also a glycoprotein) located on the glycocalyx of many epithelial cells lining the throat and lungs. Even though they cannot live by themselves, it turns out that all viruses are covered with sugars. Without sugars, they cannot bind to human or animal cells. They have to bind in order to infiltrate the cell membrane and use the production facilities of the host cell to make copies of themselves and move on to other uninfected cells. They are racing against time before the immune system stops them.

​The critical thing about this fact of glycobiology is to realize that if there is no array of sugars surrounding the cell or organism, it is dead. That's what sugars have to do with life!