Recent advances in the synthesis of C-oligosaccharides.

This paper reviews the recent advances in the synthesis of catabolically stable sugar mimetics, C-oligosaccharides. These compounds are synthetic analogs of the naturally occurring O-oligosaccharides, in which the interglycosidic oxygen has been replaced by a methylene group. This review is organized in terms of chemistry used to assemble C-oligosaccarides under the sub-headings: anionic approaches, cationic methods, reductive glycosyl samarium chemistry, cyclization methodology, and free radical chemistry.