Analyzing N-Glycans in Cerebrospinal Fluid: A Glycomics Approach

Cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) plays a crucial role in direct interaction with the brain, making it an essential sample for identifying molecular markers that emerge as neurological disorders progress. Notably, changes in protein glycosylation are observed in many neurodegenerative diseases. However, analyzing the glycome profile of CSF is challenging due to low protein concentration. N-glycans are chemically modified through permethylation to quantify these changes accurately and analyzed using a highly sensitive liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry (LC-MS) technique. This study outlines a method for preparing samples with optimized conditions for N-glycan digestion combined with a sensitive detection system. The approach has proven reliable and consistent in measuring various permethylated N-glycans extracted from CSF.