Shiyue Zhou

Defining putative glycan cancer biomarkers by MS

For decades, the association between aberrant glycosylation and many types of cancers has been shown. However, defining the changes of glycan structures has not been demonstrated until recently. This has been facilitated by the major advances in MS and separation science, which allows the detailed characterization of glycan changes associated with cancer. MS glycomics methods have been successfully employed to compare the glycomic profiles of different human specimens collected from disease-free individuals and patients with cancer. Additionally, comparing the glycomic profiles of glycoproteins purified from specimen collected from disease-free individuals and patients with cancer has also been performed. These types of glycan analyses employing MS or LC-MS allow the characterization of native, labeled and permethylated glycans. This review discusses the different glycomic and glycoproteomic methods employed for defining glycans as cancer biomarkers of different organs, including breast, colon, esophagus, liver, lung, ovarian, pancreas and prostate.

LC-MS profiling of N-Glycans derived from human serum samples for biomarker discovery in hepatocellular carcinoma.

Defining clinically relevant biomarkers for early stage hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) in a high-risk population of cirrhotic patients has potentially far-reaching implications for disease management and patient health. Changes in glycan levels have been associated with the onset of numerous diseases including cancer. In the present study, we used liquid chromatography coupled with electrospray ionization mass spectrometry (LC–ESI-MS) to analyze N-glycans in sera from 183 participants recruited in Egypt and the U.S. and identified candidate biomarkers that distinguish HCC cases from cirrhotic controls. N-Glycans were released from serum proteins and permethylated prior to the LC–ESI-MS analysis. Through two complementary LC–ESI-MS quantitation approaches, global profiling and targeted quantitation, we identified 11 N-glycans with statistically significant differences between HCC cases and cirrhotic controls. These glycans can further be categorized into four structurally related clusters, matching closely with the implications of important glycosyltransferases in cancer progression and metastasis. The results of this study illustrate the power of the integrative approach combining complementary LC–ESI-MS based quantitation approaches to investigate changes in N-glycan levels between HCC cases and patients with liver cirrhosis.

Automated annotation and quantification of glycans using liquid chromatography–mass spectrometry

UNLABELLED As a common post-translational modification, protein glycosylation plays an important role in many biological processes, and it is known to be associated with human diseases. Mass spectrometry (MS)-based glycomic profiling techniques have been developed to measure the abundances of glycans in complex biological samples and applied to the discovery of putative glycan biomarkers. To automate the annotation of glycomic profiles in the liquid chromatography-MS (LC-MS) data, we present here a user-friendly software tool, MultiGlycan, implemented in C# on Windows systems. We tested MultiGlycan by using several glycomic profiling datasets acquired using LC-MS under different preparations and show that MultiGlycan executes fast and generates robust and reliable results. AVAILABILITY MultiGlycan can be freely downloaded at http://darwin.informatics.indiana.edu/MultiGlycan/. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION Supplementary data are available at Bioinformatics online.

Glycomic Profiling of Tissue Sections by LC-MS

Because routine preparation of glycan samples involves multiple reaction and cleaning steps at which sample loss occurs, glycan analysis is typically performed using large tissue samples. This type of analysis yields no detailed molecular spatial information and requires special care to maintain proper storage and shipping conditions. We describe here a new glycan sample preparation protocol using minimized sample preparation steps and optimized procedures. Tissue sections and spotted samples first undergo on-surface enzymatic digestion to release N-glycans. The released glycans are then reduced and permethylated prior to online purification and LC-electrospray ionization (ESI)-MS analysis. The efficiency of this protocol was initially evaluated using model glycoproteins and human blood serum (HBS) spotted on glass or Teflon slides. The new protocol permitted the detection of permethylated N-glycans derived from 10 ng RNase B. On the other hand, 66 N-glycans were identified when injecting the equivalent of permethylated glycans derived from a 0.1-μL aliquot of HBS. On-tissue enzymatic digestion of nude mouse brain tissue permitted the detection of 43 N-glycans. The relative peak areas of these 43 glycans were comparable to those from a C57BL/6 mouse reported by the Consortium for Functional Glycomics (CFG). However, the sample size analyzed in the protocol described here was substantially smaller than for the routine method (submicrogram vs mg). The on-tissue N-glycan profiling method permits high sensitivity and reproducibility and can be widely applied to assess the spatial distribution of glycans associated with tissue sections, and may be correlated with immunoflourescence imaging when adjacent tissue sections are analyzed.

LC‐MS/MS analysis of permethylated free oligosaccharides and N‐glycans derived from human, bovine, and goat milk samples

Oligosaccharides in milk not only provide nutrition to the infants but also have significant immune biofunctions such as inhibition of pathogen binding to the host cell. The main component in milk oligosaccharides is free oligosaccharides. Since the proteins in milk are highly glycosylated, N‐glycans in milk also play an import role. In this study, we investigated the permethylated free oligosaccharides and N‐glycans extracted from bovine, goat, and human milks using LC‐MS/MS. Quantitation profiles of free oligosaccharides and N‐glycans were reported. The number of free oligosaccharides observed in bovine, goat, and human milk samples (without isomeric consideration) were 11, 8, and 11, respectively. Human milk had more complex free oligosaccharides structures than the other two milk samples. Totally 58, 21, and 43 N‐glycan structures (without isomeric consideration) were associated with whey proteins extracted from bovine, goat, and human milk samples, respectively. Bovine milk free oligosaccharides and N‐glycans from whey proteins were highly sialylated and to a lesser extend fucosylated. Goat and human milk free oligosaccharides and N‐glycans from whey proteins were both highly fucosylated. Also, the isomeric glycans in milk samples were determined by porous graphitic carbon LC at elevated temperatures. For example, separation of human milk free oligosaccharide Gal‐GlcNAc‐(Fuc)‐Gal‐Glc and Gal‐GlcNAc‐Gal‐Glc‐Fuc isomers was achieved using porous graphitic carbon column. Permethylation of the glycan structures facilitated the interpretation of MS/MS. For example, internal cleavage and glycosidic bond cleavage are readily distinguished in the tandem mass spectra of permethylated glycans. This feature resulted in the identification of several isomers.

Quantitative LC–MS/MS Glycomic Analysis of Biological Samples Using AminoxyTMT

Protein glycosylation plays an important role in various biological processes, such as modification of protein function, regulation of protein-protein interactions, and control of turnover rates of proteins. Moreover, glycans have been considered as potential biomarkers for many mammalian diseases and development of aberrant glycosylation profiles is an important indicator of the pathology of a disease or cancer. Hence, quantitation is an important aspect of a comprehensive glycomics study. Although numerous MS-based quantitation strategies have been developed in the past several decades, some issues affecting sensitivity and accuracy of quantitation still exist, and the development of more effective quantitation strategies is still required. Aminoxy tandem mass tag (aminoxyTMT) reagents are recently commercialized isobaric tags which enable relative quantitation of up to six different glycan samples simultaneously. In this study, liquid chromatography and mass spectrometry conditions have been optimized to achieve reliable LC-MS/MS quantitative glycomic analysis using aminoxyTMT reagents. Samples were resuspended in 0.2 M sodium chloride solution to promote the formation of sodium adduct precursor ions, which leads to higher MS/MS reporter ion yields. This method was first evaluated with glycans from model glycoproteins and pooled human blood serum samples. The observed variation of reporter ion ratios was generally less than 10% relative to the theoretical ratio. Even for the highly complex minor N-glycans, the variation was still below 15%. This strategy was further applied to the glycomic profiling of N-glycans released from blood serum samples of patients with different esophageal diseases. Our results demonstrate the benefits of utilizing aminoxyTMT reagents for reliable quantitation of biological glycomic samples.

LC-MS/MS analysis of permethylated N-glycans facilitating isomeric characterization

AbstractThe biosynthesis of glycans is a template-free process; hence compositionally identical glycans may contain highly heterogeneous structures. Meanwhile, the functions of glycans in biological processes are significantly influenced by the glycan structure. Structural elucidation of glycans is an essential component of glycobiology. Although NMR is considered the most powerful approach for structural glycan studies, it suffers from low sensitivity and requires highly purified glycans. Although mass spectrometry (MS)-based methods have been applied in numerous glycan structure studies, there are challenges in preserving glycan structure during ionization. Permethylation is an efficient derivatization method that improves glycan structural stability. In this report, permethylated glycans are isomerically separated; thus facilitating structural analysis of a mixture of glycans by LC-MS/MS. Separation by porous graphitic carbon liquid chromatography at high temperatures in conjunction with tandem mass spectrometry (PGC-LC-MS/MS) was utilized for unequivocal characterization of glycan isomers. Glycan fucosylation sites were confidently determined by eliminating fucose rearrangement and assignment of diagnostic ions, achieved by permethylation and PGC-LC at high temperatures, respectively. Assigning monosaccharide residues to specific glycan antennae was also achieved. Galactose linkages were also distinguished from each other by CID/HCD tandem MS. This was attainable because of the different bond energies associated with monosaccharide linkages. Graphical AbstractLC-MS and tandem MS of terminal galactose isomers

Automated annotation and quantitation of glycans by liquid chromatography/electrospray ionization mass spectrometric analysis using the MultiGlycan-ESI computational tool

RATIONALE Liquid chromatography/mass spectrometry (LC/MS) is currently considered to be a conventional glycomics analysis strategy due to the high sensitivity and ability to handle complex biological samples. Interpretation of LC/MS data is a major bottleneck in high-throughput glycomics LC/MS-based analysis. The complexity of LC/MS data associated with biological samples prompts the needs to develop computational tools capable of facilitating automated data annotation and quantitation. METHODS An LC/MS-based automated data annotation and quantitation software, MultiGlycan-ESI, was developed and utilized for glycan quantitation. Data generated by the software from LC/MS analysis of permethylated N-glycans derived from fetuin were initially validated by manual integration to assess the performance of the software. The performance of MultiGlycan-ESI was then assessed for the quantitation of permethylated fetuin N-glycans analyzed at different concentrations or spiked with permethylated N-glycans derived from human blood serum. RESULTS The relative abundance differences between data generated by the software and those generated by manual integration were less than 5%, indicating the reliability of MultiGlycan-ESI in quantitation of permethylated glycans analyzed by LC/MS. Automated quantitation resulted in a linear relationship for all six N-glycans derived from 50 ng to 400 ng fetuin with correlation coefficients (R(2) ) greater than 0.93. Spiking of permethylated fetuin N-glycans at different concentrations in permethylated N-glycan samples derived from a 0.02 μL of HBS also exhibited linear agreement with R(2) values greater than 0.9. CONCLUSIONS With a variety of options, including mass accuracy, merged adducts, and filtering criteria, MultiGlycan-ESI allows automated annotation and quantitation of LC/ESI-MS N-glycan data. The software allows the reliable quantitation of glycan LC/MS data. The software is reliable for automated glycan quantitation, thus facilitating rapid and reliable high-throughput glycomics studies.

LC–MS/MS of permethylated N-glycans derived from model and human blood serum glycoproteins

LC–MS/MS is one of the most powerful tools for N‐glycan structure elucidation; however, it is still challenging to identify some glycan structures with low abundance. In this study, we investigated the chromatographic behavior of permethylated N‐glycans. The relationship between retention times versus molecular weight of dextran, dextrin, and model glycans was investigated. Also, the nonpolar surface area of glycans was calculated and compared to their experimental retention times. Both retention time and nonpolar surface area trends are similar when the intermolecular interaction is included in the calculation. Moreover, retention time corresponds to glycan types and branch types. The N‐glycans analysis model, which combines high mass accuracy and retention time, was applied to confirm serum N‐glycans. In total, there were 78 N‐glycan compositions identified. A linear relationship between retention times and molecular weights were observed for each subgroup of glycan structures, for example, R2 value for complex N‐glycans was determined to be > 0.98. Moreover, the retention time could be further applied to distinguish between structural isomers as well as linkage isomers. MS/MS data were used to confirm the structural isomers.

Isomeric Separation of Permethylated Glycans by Porous Graphitic Carbon (PGC)-LC-MS/MS at High Temperatures

Permethylation is a common derivatization method for MS-based glycomic analyses. Permethylation enhances glycan ionization efficiency in positive MS analysis and improves glycan structural stability. Recent biological glycomic studies have added to the growing body of knowledge and suggest the need for complete structural analysis of glycans. However, reverse phase LC analysis of permethylated glycans usually results in poor isomeric separation. To achieve isomeric separation of permethylated glycans, a porous graphitic carbon (PGC) column was used. PGC columns are well-known for their isomeric separation capability for hydrophilic analyses. In this study, we have optimized temperature conditions to overcome the issues encountered while separating permethylated glycans on a PGC column and found that the highest temperature examined, 75 °C, was optimal. Additionally, we utilized tandem MS to elucidate detailed structural information for the isomers separated. Glycan standards were also utilized to facilitate structural identifications through MS/MS spectra and retention time comparison. The result is an efficient and sensitive method capable of the isomeric separation of permethylated glycans. This method was successfully applied for the isomeric characterization of N-glycans released from the breast cancer cell lines MDA-MB-231 and MDA-MB-231BR (brain seeking). A total of 127 unique glycan structures were identified with 39 isobaric structures, represented as 106 isomers, with 21 nonisomeric glycans. Thirty seven structures exhibited significant differences in isomeric distribution (P < 0.05). Additionally, alterations in the distribution of isomeric sialylated glycans, structures known to be involved in cell attachment to the blood-brain barrier during brain metastasis, were observed.