Role of carbohydrates as therapeutic agents

Abstract

Carbohydrates are naturally occurring compounds essential for life, which includes sugars, starch and cellulose as well as component of bacterial cell wall¹. The development of carbohydrates as therapeutics continues to gain interest, as the biological roles of these polymers are further elucidated and understood. Recent advances in the understanding of carbohydrate specific transport mechanism and the development of novel carbohydrate based bioactive may overcome many of the previous limitations of stability and bioavailability, suggest that carbohydrate based compounds may provide a rich source of new drug candidates for a variety of disease