Editorial [ Immune Receptors for Glycoconjugates Guest Editor: Dapeng Zhou ]

I would like to thank Prof. Ben M. Dunn, Editor in Chief of CPPS, for supporting my proposal in organizing this special issue on Immune receptors for glycoconjugates. The aim of this issue is to highlight the rapid progress in our understanding of glycoconjugate-mediated communication in the context of immune responses. Only after this project was completed did I recognize what a precious chance it was for me to serve the community of glycobiology and immunology. In retrospect, I am so thankful to all the authors and reviewers for their excellent contribution. Many of them sacrificed weekends or holidays, as evidenced by my records of dates in receiving emails. I am greatly encouraged by the brilliance of every article after these synergized efforts. I have very much enjoyed the learning from each author and each reviewer. The selected topics have been based on my personal view of the important questions. These include the dendritic cell lectins, the lectins that interact with HIV, the glycopeptide antigens, the immune responses to bacteria polysaccharides, and the glycolipid antigens. These articles cover the carbohydrate recognition in both the innate immunity and the adaptive immunity. In every article, the power of biochemistry and glyco-chemistry is highlighted. I hope the concepts and strategic designs proposed by our authors will be helpful for the readers in understanding the rules of glyco-immunology. Glycoconjugates are extremely structurally diverse, with the unique central dogma being storage of information through the action of glyco-enzymes instead of genetic codes. My sincere hope is that readers will be excited enough by these articles to follow this area of research closely, and perhaps will even join us in making contributions to this very promising field of study.