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De novo structural determination of mannose oligosaccharides by using a logically derived sequence for tandem mass spectrometry

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Abstract

Carbohydrates play important roles in biological recognition processes. However, determining the structures of carbohydrates remains challenging because of their complexity. A simple tandem mass spectrometry-based method for determining the structure of underivatized mannose tetrasaccharides was demonstrated. This method employed the multistage low-energy collision-induced dissociation (CID) of sodium adducts in an ion trap, a logically derived sequence (LODES) from the dissociation mechanism for deciding the sequence of CID, and a specially prepared disaccharide spectrum database. Through this method, the linkages, anomeric configurations, and branch locations of carbohydrates could be determined without the prior assumption of possible structures. We validated this method by blind test of all the commercial available mannose tetrasaccharides. We showed that the structure of a given tetrasaccharide can be determined from 928 isomers by using only three to six appropriately selected CID mass spectra according to the proposed procedure. This method is simple and rapid and has the potential to be applied to other hexoses and oligosaccharides larger than tetrasaccharides. The CID procedures can be built in a computer-controlled mass spectrometer for automatic structural determination of underivatized oligosaccharides.

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Funding

This work was financially supported by Thematic Research Project, Academia Sinica (AS-107-TP-A08), and Ministry of Science and Technology, Taiwan (103-2113-M-001-011-NY3).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Atomic and Molecular Sciences, Academia Sinica, P.O. Box: 23-166, Taipei, 10617, Taiwan

    Hsu Chen Hsu, Shih-Pei Huang, Chia Yen Liew, Shang-Ting Tsai & Chi-Kung Ni

  2. Molecular Sceince and Technology, Taiwan International Graduate Program, Academia Sinica and National Taiwan Univeristy, Taipei, 10617, Taiwan

    Chia Yen Liew

  3. Department of Chemistry, National Tsing Hua University, Hsinchu, 30013, Taiwan

    Chi-Kung Ni

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  1. Hsu Chen Hsu
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C.K. Ni received research grants from Academia Sinica, Taiwan (AS-iMATE-107-32 and AS-TP-107-M08), and Ministry of Science and Technology, Taiwan (106-2113-M-001 -023 -MY3).

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Hsu, H.C., Huang, SP., Liew, C.Y. et al. De novo structural determination of mannose oligosaccharides by using a logically derived sequence for tandem mass spectrometry. Anal Bioanal Chem 411, 3241–3255 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00216-019-01817-y

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