Mannose is a
sugar monomer of the
aldohexose
In chemistry, a hexose is a monosaccharide (simple sugar) with six carbon atoms. The chemical formula for all hexoses is C6H12O6, and their molecular weight is 180.156 g/mol.
Hexoses exist in two forms, open-chain or cyclic, that easily conver ...
series of
carbohydrate
In organic chemistry, a carbohydrate () is a biomolecule consisting of carbon (C), hydrogen (H) and oxygen (O) atoms, usually with a hydrogen–oxygen atom ratio of 2:1 (as in water) and thus with the empirical formula (where ''m'' may or ...
s. It is a C-2
epimer of
glucose
Glucose is a simple sugar with the molecular formula . Glucose is overall the most abundant monosaccharide, a subcategory of carbohydrates. Glucose is mainly made by plants and most algae during photosynthesis from water and carbon dioxide, usi ...
. Mannose is important in human
metabolism
Metabolism (, from el, μεταβολή ''metabolē'', "change") is the set of life-sustaining chemical reactions in organisms. The three main functions of metabolism are: the conversion of the energy in food to energy available to run c ...
, especially in the
glycosylation
Glycosylation is the reaction in which a carbohydrate (or 'glycan'), i.e. a glycosyl donor, is attached to a hydroxyl or other functional group of another molecule (a glycosyl acceptor) in order to form a glycoconjugate. In biology (but not ...
of certain
protein
Proteins are large biomolecules and macromolecules that comprise one or more long chains of amino acid residues. Proteins perform a vast array of functions within organisms, including catalysing metabolic reactions, DNA replication, respon ...
s. Several
congenital disorders of glycosylation
A congenital disorder of glycosylation (previously called carbohydrate-deficient glycoprotein syndrome) is one of several rare inborn errors of metabolism in which glycosylation of a variety of tissue proteins and/or lipids is deficient or defecti ...
are associated with mutations in
enzyme
Enzymes () are proteins that act as biological catalysts by accelerating chemical reactions. The molecules upon which enzymes may act are called substrate (chemistry), substrates, and the enzyme converts the substrates into different molecule ...
s involved in mannose metabolism.
Mannose is not an
essential nutrient
A nutrient is a substance used by an organism to survive, grow, and reproduce. The requirement for dietary nutrient intake applies to animals, plants, fungi, and protists. Nutrients can be incorporated into cells for metabolic purposes or ex ...
; it can be produced in the human body from glucose, or converted into glucose. Mannose provides 2–5
kcal
The calorie is a unit of energy. For historical reasons, two main definitions of "calorie" are in wide use. The large calorie, food calorie, or kilogram calorie was originally defined as the amount of heat needed to raise the temperature of o ...
/g. It is partially excreted in the
urine
Urine is a liquid by-product of metabolism in humans and in many other animals. Urine flows from the kidneys through the ureters to the urinary bladder. Urination results in urine being excreted from the body through the urethra.
Cellular ...
.
Etymology
The root of both "mannose" and "
mannitol
Mannitol is a type of sugar alcohol used as a sweetener and medication. It is used as a low calorie sweetener as it is poorly absorbed by the intestines. As a medication, it is used to decrease pressure in the eyes, as in glaucoma, and to low ...
" is
manna
Manna ( he, מָן, mān, ; ar, اَلْمَنُّ; sometimes or archaically spelled mana) is, according to the Bible, an edible substance which God provided for the Israelites during their travels in the desert during the 40-year period follow ...
, which the
Bible
The Bible (from Koine Greek , , 'the books') is a collection of religious texts or scriptures that are held to be sacred in Christianity, Judaism, Samaritanism, and many other religions. The Bible is an anthologya compilation of texts o ...
describes as the food supplied to the Israelites during their journey in the region of
Sinai. Several trees and shrubs can produce a substance called manna, such as the "manna tree" (''
Fraxinus ornus'') from whose secretions mannitol was originally isolated.
Structure
Mannose commonly exists as two different-sized rings, the
pyranose (six-membered) form and the
furanose (five-membered) form. Each ring closure can have either an alpha or beta configuration at the
anomer
In carbohydrate chemistry, a pair of anomers () is a pair of near-identical stereoisomers that differ at only the anomeric carbon, the carbon that bears the aldehyde or ketone functional group in the sugar's open-chain form. However, in order f ...
ic position. The chemical rapidly undergoes
isomerization among these four forms.
Metabolism
While much of the mannose used in glycosylation is believed to be derived from glucose, in
cultured
Culture () is an umbrella term which encompasses the social behavior, institutions, and norms found in human societies, as well as the knowledge, beliefs, arts, laws, customs, capabilities, and habits of the individuals in these groups.Tylor ...
hepatoma cells (cancerous cells from the liver), most of the mannose for glycoprotein biosynthesis comes from extracellular mannose, not glucose. Many of the glycoproteins produced in the liver are secreted into the bloodstream, so dietary mannose is distributed throughout the body.
Mannose is present in numerous glycoconjugates including ''N''-linked glycosylation of proteins. ''C''-Mannosylation is also abundant and can be found in collagen-like regions.
The digestion of many polysaccharides and glycoproteins yields mannose, which is phosphorylated by
hexokinase to generate mannose-6-phosphate. Mannose-6-phosphate is converted to
fructose-6-phosphate
Fructose 6-phosphate (sometimes called the Neuberg ester) is a derivative of fructose, which has been phosphorylated at the 6-hydroxy group. It is one of several possible fructosephosphates. The β-D-form of this compound is very common in cells. ...
, by the enzyme
phosphomannose isomerase
Mannose-6 phosphate isomerase (MPI), alternately phosphomannose isomerase (PMI) () is an enzyme which facilitates the interconversion of fructose 6-phosphate (F6P) and mannose-6-phosphate (M6P). Mannose-6-phosphate isomerase may also enable the s ...
, and then enters the
glycolytic pathway or is converted to
glucose-6-phosphate by the
gluconeogenic pathway of
hepatocytes.
Mannose is a dominant monosaccharide in ''N''-linked glycosylation, which is a
post-translational modification
Post-translational modification (PTM) is the covalent and generally enzymatic modification of proteins following protein biosynthesis. This process occurs in the endoplasmic reticulum and the golgi apparatus. Proteins are synthesized by ribos ...
of proteins. It is initiated by the ''en bloc'' transfer on Glc3Man9GlcNAc2 to nascent glycoproteins in the endoplasmic reticulum in a co-translational manner as the protein entered through the transport system. Glucose is
hydrolyzed on fully folded protein and the mannose moieties are hydrolyzed by ER and Golgi-resident mannosidases. Typically, mature human glycoproteins only contain three mannose residues buried under sequential modification by GlcNAc, galactose, and sialic acid. This is important, as the innate immune system in mammals is geared to recognise exposed mannose residues. This activity is due to the prevalence of mannose residues, in the form of mannans, on the surfaces of yeasts. The human immunodeficiency virus displays considerable amount of mannose residues due to the tight clustering of glycans in its viral spike. These mannose residues are the target for
broadly neutralizing antibodies.
Biotechnology
Recombinant proteins produced in yeast may be subject to mannose addition in patterns different from those used by mammalian cells. This difference in recombinant proteins from those normally produced in mammalian organisms may influence the effectiveness of vaccines.
Formation
Mannose can be formed by the oxidation of
mannitol
Mannitol is a type of sugar alcohol used as a sweetener and medication. It is used as a low calorie sweetener as it is poorly absorbed by the intestines. As a medication, it is used to decrease pressure in the eyes, as in glaucoma, and to low ...
.
It can also be formed from glucose in the
Lobry-de Bruyn-van Ekenstein transformation.
Uses
Mannose (D-mannose) is used as a
dietary supplement
A dietary supplement is a manufactured product intended to supplement one's diet by taking a pill, capsule, tablet, powder, or liquid. A supplement can provide nutrients either extracted from food sources or that are synthetic in orde ...
to prevent recurrent
urinary tract infection
A urinary tract infection (UTI) is an infection that affects part of the urinary tract. When it affects the lower urinary tract it is known as a bladder infection (cystitis) and when it affects the upper urinary tract it is known as a kidne ...
s (UTIs).
, one review found that taking mannose was as effective as
antibiotic
An antibiotic is a type of antimicrobial substance active against bacteria. It is the most important type of antibacterial agent for fighting pathogenic bacteria, bacterial infections, and antibiotic medications are widely used in the therapy, ...
s to prevent UTIs,
[ while another review found that ]clinical trial
Clinical trials are prospective biomedical or behavioral research studies on human subject research, human participants designed to answer specific questions about biomedical or behavioral interventions, including new treatments (such as novel v ...
quality was too low to allow any conclusion about using D‐mannose to prevent or treat UTIs.[
]
Configuration
Mannose differs from glucose by inversion of the C-2 chiral center. Mannose displays a pucker in the solution ring form. This simple change leads to the drastically different biochemistry of the two hexoses. This change has the same effect on the other aldohexose
In chemistry, a hexose is a monosaccharide (simple sugar) with six carbon atoms. The chemical formula for all hexoses is C6H12O6, and their molecular weight is 180.156 g/mol.
Hexoses exist in two forms, open-chain or cyclic, that easily conver ...
s, as well.
Mannose PTS permease
The PEP-dependent sugar transporting phosphotransferase system transports and simultaneously phosphorylates its sugar substrates. Mannose XYZ permease is a member of the family, with this distinct method being used by bacteria for sugar uptake particularly exogenous hexoses in the case of mannose XYZ to release the phosphate esters into the cell cytoplasm in preparation for metabolism primarily through the route of glycolysis. The MANXYZ transporter complex is also involved in infection of ''E. coli'' by bacteriophage lambda, with subunit ManY and ManZ being sufficient for proper lambda phage infection.
MANXYZ possesses four domains in three polypeptide chains; ManX, ManY, and ManZ. The ManX subunit forms a homodimer that is localized to the cytoplasmic side of the membrane. ManX contains two domains IIA and IIB linked by a hinge peptide with each domain containing a phosphorylation site and phosphoryl transfer occurs between both subunits. ManX can be membrane bound or not. The ManY and ManNZ subunits are hydrophobic integral membrane proteins with six and one transmembrane alpha helical spanner(s). The phosphoryl group of PEP is transferred to the imported sugar via Enzyme 1, histidine protein phosphate carrier, and then to the ManX, ManY, and ManZ subunits of the ManXYZ transportation complex, which phosphorylates the entering hexose sugar, creating a hexose-6-phosphate.
See also
* α-Mannosidase
* Mannose receptor
* Mannan oligosaccharide-based nutritional supplements
*Rhamnose
Rhamnose (Rha, Rham) is a naturally occurring deoxy sugar. It can be classified as either a methyl- pentose or a 6-deoxy- hexose. Rhamnose predominantly occurs in nature in its L-form as L-rhamnose (6-deoxy-L- mannose). This is unusual, since mo ...
, 6-deoxy-L-mannose
*PTS Mannose-Fructose-Sorbose Family
The PTS Mannose-Fructose-Sorbose (Man) FamilyTC# 4.A.6 is a group of multicomponent PTS systems that are involved in sugar uptake in bacteria. This transport process is dependent on several cytoplasmic phosphoryl transfer proteins - Enzyme I (I) ...
References
{{Carbohydrates
Aldohexoses
Articles containing video clips
Pyranoses
Glycerols