Abstract: In order to identify the N-glycans which are closely related with tongue cancer and provide the evidence to help the early diagnosis, prevention and treatment, the N-glycome in the serum of the healthy volunteers and patients with tongue cancer was compared. The human serum samples was collected and the N-glycans of the whole glycoprotein using N-glycan-FASP-T was isolated, and then identified and was their structures determined by MALDI-TOF/TOF tandem mass spectrometry. After that, the relationship between N-glycan abundance and the tongue cancer was analyzed by the method of ROC curve. Compared to healthy volunteers, in the serum of the patients with tongue cancer, the level of hybrid type, three-antenna and bisecting N-glycans are increased, while the two antennas and four antennas are N-glycans reduced. In addition, there are more terminal Neu5Gc. The statistical analysis results showed that 10 N-glycan structures were significantly upregulated in the course of tongue cancer (AUC>0.50, and AUC to 0.75, which m/z=1256.510/1418.573).

Key words: oral cancer, MALDI-TOF-MS, N-glycan-FASP-T, N-linked glycans, glycomics