Fleeting sugar pairs may help curb abnormal cell-growth signals

Acting as armor, a scaffold and a communication platform in one, our cells' plasma membrane lies at the heart of many crucial cellular processes. Traditionally, it has been thought to function through interactions among its various proteins and lipids. Now, researchers have revealed a crucial yet often overlooked membrane component—complex sugar chains, known as glycans, carried by certain membrane lipids called gangliosides and many membrane proteins.