Changes of serum IgG glycosylation patterns in rheumatoid arthritis

BACKGROUND: RA is a common chronic and systemic autoimmune disease, and the diagnosis is based significantly on autoantibody detection. This study aims to investigate the glycosylation profile of serum IgG in RA patients using high-throughput lectin microarray technology. METHOD: Lectin microarray containing 56 lectins was applied to detect and analyze the expression profile of serum IgG glycosylation in 214 RA patients, 150 disease controls (DC), and 100 healthy controls (HC). Significant differential glycan profiles between the groups of RA and DC/HC as well as RA subgroups were explored and verified by lectin blot technique. The prediction models were created to evaluate the feasibility of those candidate biomarkers. RESULTS: As a comprehensive analysis of lectin microarray and lectin blot, results showed that compare with HC or DC groups, serum IgG from RA patients had a higher affinity to the SBA lectin (recognizing glycan GalNAc). For RA subgroups, RA-seropositive group had higher affinities to the lectins of MNA-M (recognizing glycan mannose) and AAL (recognizing glycan fucose), and RA-ILD group had higher affinities to the lectins of ConA (recognizing glycan mannose) and MNA-M while a lower affinity to the PHA-E (recognizing glycan Galβ4GlcNAc) lectin. The predicted models indicated corresponding feasibility of those biomarkers. CONCLUSION: Lectin microarray is an effective and reliable technique for analyzing multiple lectin–glycan interactions. RA, RA-seropositive, and RA-ILD patients exhibit distinct glycan profiles, respectively. Altered levels of glycosylation may be related to the pathogenesis of the disease, which could provide a direction for new biomarkers identification. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12014-023-09395-z.