engleski

Human Plasma Glycome in Attention-Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder and Autism Spectrum Disorders

Over a half of all proteins are glycosylated, and their proper glycosylation is essential for normal function. Unfortunately, due to structural complexity of nonlinear branched glycans and the absence of genetic template for their synthesis, the knowledge about glycans is lagging significantly behind the knowledge about proteins or DNA. Using a recently developed quantitative high throughput glycan analysis methods we quantified components of the plasma N‐glycome in 99 children with attention‐deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), 81 child and 5 adults with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and total of 340 matching healthy controls. No changes in plasma glycome were found to associate with ASD, but several highly significant associations were observed with ADHD. Further structural analysis of plasma glycans revealed that ADHD is associated with increased antennary fucosylation of biantennary glycans and decreased levels of some complex glycans with three or four antennas. The design of this study prevented any functional conclusions about the observed associations, but specific differences in glycosylation appears to be strongly associated with ADHD what warrants further studies into this direction.

attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) ; autism spectrum disorder (ASD) ; plasma

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