Abstract
Serum anti-glycan antibodies play important roles in many immune processes and are of particular interest as biomarkers for many diseases. Changes in anti-glycan antibodies can occur with the onset of disease or in response to stimuli such as pathogens and vaccination. Understanding relationships between anti-glycan antibody repertoires and genetic and environment factors is critical for basic research and clinical applications, but little information is available. In this study we evaluated the effects of age, race, gender, and blood type on anti-glycan antibody profiles in the serum of 135 healthy subjects. As expected, IgG and IgM antibody signals to blood group antigens correlated strongly with blood type. Interestingly, antibodies to other non-ABH glycans, such as the alpha-Gal antigen, also correlated with blood type. A statistically significant decline in IgM signals with age was observed for many antibody subpopulations, but not for IgG. Moreover, statistically significant correlations between race and IgG levels to certain LacNAc-containing glycans were observed. The results have important implications for designing studies and interpreting results in the area of biomarker discovery and for the development of vaccines. The study also highlights the importance of collecting and reporting patient information that could affect serum anti-glycan antibody levels.
Highlights
Information about the factors that influence antibody repertoires is critical for both basic research and biomarker studies
Anti-glycan serum antibodies are a key element of the immune system and are a rich but underexplored source of potential biomarkers
Information about factors that influence serum levels of anti-glycan antibodies is crucial for understanding the roles of these antibodies and for exploiting them for clinical applications
Summary
Information about the factors that influence antibody repertoires is critical for both basic research and biomarker studies. Antigen exposure accounts only partially for variations among individuals in their repertoire of serum anti-glycan antibodies. Information about the factors that affect anti-glycan antibody diversity are essential for designing appropriate studies, analyzing results, and distinguishing disease-specific changes from normal variation between individuals. Knowing which traits account for variation in anti-glycan antibodies among individuals will help to identify differences between cases and controls that are disease specific. Age has been reported to affect anti-glycan antibody profiles, but different studies have found inconsistent effects, including decreases www.nature.com/scientificreports/. More information on factors that contribute to variations of anti-glycan antibody levels are needed to properly design experiments and interpret results. We used glycan array technology to evaluate changes in free serum anti-glycan and anti-glycopeptide IgG and IgM of 135 healthy subjects of varied age, race, gender, and blood type. Our results help to resolve previous conflicting reports on the effects of age and provide important information for designing and interpreting studies in the area of biomarker research and vaccine developments
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