Pregnancy diagnosis and sex identification with urinary glycopatterns of two mammal species

Jiayi Yang; Shiyu Jin; Simeng Zhang; Shujun He; Rui Chen; Yinghu Lei; Ruliang Pan; He Zhang; Zhongfu Wang; Zheng Li; Hanjie Yu; Guixin Dong; Changhong Shi; Baoguo Li; Songtao Guo

doi:10.1016/j.isci.2023.108439

Pregnancy diagnosis and sex identification with urinary glycopatterns of two mammal species

iScience. 2023 Nov 14;26(12):108439. doi: 10.1016/j.isci.2023.108439. eCollection 2023 Dec 15.

Authors

Jiayi Yang¹, Shiyu Jin¹, Simeng Zhang¹, Shujun He², Rui Chen¹, Yinghu Lei³, Ruliang Pan^{1

4}, He Zhang¹, Zhongfu Wang⁵, Zheng Li⁶, Hanjie Yu⁶, Guixin Dong⁷, Changhong Shi⁸, Baoguo Li¹, Songtao Guo^{1

9}

Affiliations

¹ Shaanxi Key Laboratory for Animal Conservation, College of Life Sciences, Northwest University, Xi'an 710069, China.
² Shaanxi Institute of Zoology, Xi'an 710032, China.
³ Qinling Giant Panda Research Center (Shaanxi rare wildlife rescue base), Shaanxi Academy of Forestry, Xi'an 710402, China.
⁴ School of Human Sciences, The University of Western Australia, Australia and Centre for Evolutionary Biology, College of Biological Sciences, The University of Western Australia, Perth, WA 6009, Australia.
⁵ College of Food Science and Technology, Northwest University, Xi'an 710069, China.
⁶ Laboratory for Functional Glycomics, College of Life Sciences, Northwest University, Xi'an 710069, China.
⁷ Guangdong South China Rare Wild Animal Species Conservation Center, Zhuhai 511430, China.
⁸ Laboratory Animal Center, The Air Force Medical University, Xi'an 710032, China.
⁹ Northwest Institute of Plateau Biology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Xining 810008, China.

Abstract

Glycome in urine could be promising biomarkers for detecting pregnancy diagnosis and sex noninvasively for animals, especially for rare species. We explore the applicability of grouping golden snub-nosed monkeys by sex or diagnosing pregnancy based on their urinary glycopatterns, which are determined via lectin microarray combining mass spectrometry analysis. Sprague-Dawley rats are used to verify whether this approach and whether the glycomic biomarkers can be generalized to other mammalian species. The results show that, for both species, lectin microarray combining mass spectrometry can distinguish individuals' pregnancy status and sex; significant differences are found in the types, amounts, and terminal modification of glycans between pregnant and non-pregnant females and between females and males. This indicates the approach could be generalized to other mammalian species to group sex and detect pregnancy, yet the glycopatterns appear to be species-specific and markers developed from one species may not be directly applicable to another.

Keywords: Biochemistry; Nature conservation; Veterinary biochemistry; Zoology.