FAU researcher Leonhard Möckl receives award for his research on the sugar coating of cells.
Glycocalyx, the sugar coating of animal or human cells, is tens of thousands of times thinner than a human hair, just a few nanometers in diameter. It has long been ignored by researchers, who believed it was merely a passive protective layer. Today, however, it is known that the sugar layer has a critical influence on how cells communicate with each other, how they recognize pathogens, or how they react with their environment. Leonhard Möckl is one of the researchers who is shining the spotlight on to previously unknown worlds in cell biology. Möckl, Professor of Nano-Optical Imaging at FAU, is the head of a working group focusing on the structures and functions of the cells’ protective coating. The biophysicist has now received the Life Sciences Bridge Award of the Aventis Foundation, with its prize money of €100,000. He intends using the prize money to research glycocalyx with innovative optical procedures that allow for resolution at the sub-nanometer level.
Structural pattern indicates cell’s state
“In our current research, we were able to demonstrate that the spatial arrangement of sugar structures on the cell surface reflects the cell’s internal state,” Möckl explains, and outlines some of the challenges they faced: The cell’s protective coating consists of ten of thousands of different sugar compounds ranging from tiny “sugar trees” on proteins to huge sugar polymers. This complex organization takes place at a scale of only a few nanometers and is constantly changing. At this scale it is impossible to record, let alone mark accurately, using conventional optical procedures.”
His interdisciplinary team encompasses chemistry, cell biology and physics and focuses on using super‑resolution fluorescence microscopy. The researchers chemically mark selected sugar components without interfering to any significant extent in natural cellular processes. Using these markers, the positions of glycocalyx components can be determined with unprecedented resolution at the nanometer scale. “This labeling for glycan structures is a major innovation for our field of research,” Möckl enthuses.
Characteristic patterns
In 2025, Möckl and his team succeeded for the first time in visualizing individual sugar structures with molecular resolution. In the process, it became clear that the structures are not randomly distributed but instead form characteristic patterns. The researchers were able to demonstrate that the spatial organization of the glycocalyx changes with the physiological state of a cell, for example in activated immune cells or in tumor tissue.
In the long term, the working group hopes to develop new approaches for medical diagnostics, such as biomarkers for tumor detection or misdirected immune cells in multiple sclerosis. Perhaps one day it will even be possible to modify specific sugar structures to restore the original cell function. Until then, the researchers still have plenty of work ahead: for example, optimizing labeling methods and optical technologies to “obtain more accurate information.” This also includes capturing additional tissue types, increasing the number of samples, and implementing automated data collection and analysis. Which sugar profiles are associated with specific disease courses or therapy responses is the subject of further research. Larger clinical studies are in the pipeline.
Since 2020, Leonhard Möckl has led the “Physical Glycosciences” research group at the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Light in Erlangen. Since 2024, he has been Professor of Nano-Optical Imaging at FAU.
He studied chemistry and biochemistry at Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich. In 2015, he earned his doctorate there with a thesis on the role of the glycocalyx in the organization of membrane proteins. He then conducted several years of postdoctoral research at Stanford University in the lab of Nobel laureate W. E. Moerner.
In 2023, Möckl was awarded the Arnold Sommerfeld Prize by the Bavarian Academy of Sciences and Humanities for outstanding achievements in biophysics. For his 2025 paper published in the journal *Nature Nanotechnology*, he received the Publication Prize from the Else Kröner-Fresenius Foundation. Under the term “glycan atlasing,” Möckl presented the first “map” at the level of individual sugar structures, developed by his research group. The profiles of cell surfaces range from cell culture lines to human immune cells, organoids, and cancer tissue from various organs.