Abstract: Ligands in the form of N-acetyllactosamines which bind to endothelial leukocyte adhesion molecule-1 (ELAM-1) are disclosed. The ligand compounds can be formulated into pharmaceutical compositions and/or assay compositions used to alleviate inflammation and assay for the presence of (qualitative) and amount of (quantitative) ELAM-1 and thereby determine the presence, location and degree of inflammation. The ligands are encompassed by general structural formula I as follows: ##STR1## wherein one of F and G is hydrogen and one is an N-acetyl neuraminic acid residue on the terminal unit and are both hydrogen on any other unit; J is hydrogen, a lactosylceramide or a linking group and K is hydrogen or a fucose residue and n is an integer of from 1 to 10 (preferably 3 or 4) with the proviso that n and K are defined such that at least one K is a fucose residue.