Fractionation of asparagine-linked oligosaccharides by serial lectin-Agarose affinity chromatography. A rapid, sensitive, and specific technique.

We present a general technique for fractionating cell-derived asparagine-linked oligosaccharides on the basis of oligosaccharide structure. This procedure has been applied to the study of [2-3H]mannose-labeled mouse lymphoma cells (BW5147). The fractionation scheme involves serial chromatography on concanavalin A-Sepharose, pea lectin-Sepharose, and leukoagglutinating phytohemagglutinin-agarose. Approximately 85% of the labeled glycopeptides was retained on one or more of the affinity columns. The various fractions eluted from the columns contain relatively pure populations of glycopeptides which were used for structural analysis. The recovery of the glycopeptides was quantitative. The procedure was used to estimate the overall spectrum of Asn-linked oligosaccharides synthesized by the lymphoma cell line. We conclude that serial lectin-agarose affinity chromatography is a rapid, sensitive, and specific technique for fractionating and analyzing Asn-linked oligosaccharides. A general fractionation scheme employing additional lectins is presented.