The syntheses of novel heteroanalogues of methyl maltoside and methyl kojibioside containing sulfur in the nonreducing ring and nitrogen in the interglycosidic linkage are described. The compounds are substrate analogues for glucosidases and are of interest as potential inhibitors of these enzymes. The synthesis relied upon the acid-catalyzed condensation of 5-thio-D-glucose with either methyl 4-amino-4-deoxy-alpha-D-glucopyranoside or methyl 2-amino-2-deoxy-beta-D-glucopyranoside in methanol solvent. Thus, the interconverting anomeric mixtures, methyl 5’-thio-4-N-alpha-maltoside (5 alpha), methyl 5’-thio-4-N-alpha-cellobioside (5 beta) and methyl 5’-thio-2-N-beta-kojibioside 6 alpha, methyl 5’-thio-2-N-beta-sophoroside 6 beta, were synthesized in 55% and 52% yield, respectively. Acetylation of the anomeric mixtures yielded anomers which were separable and did not mutarotate. A comparison of NOE data for free 5 alpha and transferred NOE data for a mixture of 5 alpha and glucoamylase G1 suggests that 5 alpha is bound by the enzyme in a conformation in the area of the global energy minimum of free 5 alpha. These NMR data also suggest that 5 alpha may be an inhibitor of glucoamylase. Kinetic studies indicate that a mixture of 5 alpha/5 beta is a competitive inhibitor of maltose binding by glucoamylase G2, with a K-i value for 5 alpha of 4 +/- 0.3 mu M.