Endotis Pharma joins the growing ranks of firms focused on glycoscience, or the science of sugars. Endotis' expertise is twofold: in understanding and regulating protein-sugar interactions, and in synthesizing small sugar-based drugs, or "glycodrugs," which can disrupt these interactions.

New technologies to characterize and manipulate carbohydrate chemistries and the glycosylation of proteins are spawning viable business models that address what scientists have long known: the sugar coating of proteins and cells is not decorative.