José Luis de Paz Carrera

Group: Biomolecular interactions and structural glycobiology

Position: Tenured Scientist

Contact

Tel. ext: 446261

Laboratory: L E110

Office: D S009

Email:

ORCID: 0000-0002-8555-2271

Biography

I obtained my PhD degree in 2000, under the supervision of Prof. Manuel Martín-Lomas and Prof. José M. Lassaletta Simon (Instituto de Investigaciones Químicas, IIQ, CSIC-US). During my PhD, I developed a synthetic approach for the preparation of heparin oligosaccharides that were used in structural and biological studies. From 2001 to 2004 I worked as a postdoc at IIQ. During this period, I was involved in several projects funded by chemical and pharmaceutical companies (Bioibérica S.A., Midatech Ltd and RGL Ltd). In 2004, I joined Prof. Seeberger’s group at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH, Zurich, Switzerland) as a Marie Curie postdoctoral fellow. There I worked on the preparation of sugar microarrays for the analysis of carbohydrate-protein interactions.

In 2007, I returned to Spain, joining Dr. Pedro Nieto’s group. I became a tenured scientist at IIQ in 2008. During this stage, I was responsible for the synthetic part of a multidisciplinary project aimed at the study of the interactions between glycosaminoglycan (GAG) oligosaccharides and mimetics, and certain proteins. In particular, we developed novel approaches for the synthesis of GAG (chondroitin sulfate and hyaluronic acid) oligosaccharides and mimetics, including GAG multivalent systems. Moreover, I studied their interactions with the corresponding protein receptors by using fluorescence-based techniques.

In September 2026, I joined Dr. Jesús Angulo’s lab where I am currently working on projects focused on the study of carbohydrate-protein interactions using NMR and computational methods.

Selected publications

• José L. de Paz, Pedro M. Nieto. Fluorescence Polarization Assays to Study Carbohydrate-Protein Interactions. Org. Biomol. Chem. 2025, 23, 2041-2058. https://doi.org/10.1039/D4OB02021A

• J. L. de Paz, M. J. García-Jiménez, V. Jafari, M. García-Domínguez, P. M. Nieto. Synthesis and interaction with growth factors of sulfated oligosaccharides containing an anomeric fluorinated tail. Bioorg. Chem., 2023, 141, 106929. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bioorg.2023.106929

• Myriam Torres-Rico, Susana Maza, José L. de Paz, Pedro M. Nieto. Synthesis, structure and midkine binding of chondroitin sulfate oligosaccharide analogues. Org. Biomol. Chem. 2021, 19, 5312 – 5326; https://doi.org/10.1039/D1OB00882J

• Pedro Domínguez-Rodríguez, Corinne Vivès, Michel Thepaut, Franck Fieschi, Pedro M. Nieto, José L. de Paz, Javier Rojo. Second-Generation Dendrimers with Chondroitin Sulfate Type‑E Disaccharides as Multivalent Ligands for Langerin. Biomacromolecules 2020, 21, 2726−2734. https://dx.doi.org/10.1021/acs.biomac.0c00476

• Susana Maza, Noel Gandia, José L. de Paz, Pedro M. Nieto. Fluorous-tag assisted synthesis of a glycosaminoglycan mimetic tetrasaccharide as a high-affinity FGF-2 and midkine ligand. Bioorg. Med. Chem. 2018, 26, 1076-1085; https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bmc.2018.01.022