MALDI-MS Characterization of Glycan Multivalency in Synthetic Glycan-Protein Conjugates

摘要

Glycans play significant roles in many biological processes such as inflammation, cell to cell recognition and cancer metastasis. Important glycan interactions can usually be measured via microarray experiments. Since these glycan-protein interactions are weak, preparation of multivalent glycan-protein conjugates (neoglycoproteins) for the microarray is used to increase the avidity and selectivity of interaction. Characterization of the resulting neoglycoproteins to determine and optimize glycan density is usually accomplished by MALDI-MS, although there are significant issues with the heterogeneity of the sample and the consistent detection and measurement of the high-mass molecular ions. We have therefore undertaken an investigation of sample preparation parameters and the use of a high-mass MALDI-MS ion conversion dynode detector to enhance and optimize this analysis.