Sialic acid levels in serum or saliva increase in the presence of breast cancer. CD BioGlyco has developed a set of Strategies that are used for sialic acid level analysis in breast cancer, including Sialic Acid Analysis by LC-MS, Sialic Acids Specific Bio-Affinity Strategies, etc.
According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), breast cancer is the most common malignant tumor in women worldwide and the second leading cause of cancer deaths. More than 520,000 people die each year from breast cancer, being surpassed only by lung cancer. Studies have found that about 70-80% of patients with early-stage, non-metastatic breast cancer are curable. The 5-year relative survival rate for women with stage 0 or stage I breast cancer is close to 100%. To greatly reduce the mortality of breast cancer patients, early detection of breast cancer combined with aggressive and timely medical intervention is necessary. X-ray mammography is the most commonly used method for breast cancer detection but is limited by low sensitivity and specificity. Therefore, there is an urgent need to develop a rapid, accurate, and cost-effective method for the detection of breast cancer.
Sialic acid is a class of naturally occurring carbohydrates with more than 50 members, having a common core structure neuraminic acid. N-acetylneuraminic acid (Neu5Ac) is the most prominent member of this family and is almost the only form found in human body fluids and tissues. Neu5Ac is usually located at the non-reducing end of glycans of native glycoproteins and glycolipids and plays an important role in cell-to-cell interactions, cell-to-cell signaling, tumorigenesis and metastasis, and immunity. It has been established that carcinogenesis is often accompanied by Neu5Ac overexpression, such as markedly elevated total sialic acid or glycolipid-bound sialic acid in the serum of breast cancer patients.
Fig.1 Chemical structure of Neu5Ac or sialic acid. (Hernández-Arteaga, 2017)
Due to the special metabolic flux and abnormal expression of sialyltransferase/sialidase in cancer cells, hypersialylation is often observed in tumor tissues compared to normal tissues, which accelerates cancer progression and leads to poor prognosis. It has been shown that increased sialylation is a feature in cancer tissue and blood of breast cancer patients, such as elevated sialic acid levels in the saliva of breast cancer patients. Therefore, salivary sialic acid may serve as a non-invasive predictive marker in breast cancer patients. In clinical studies, Strategies for Sialic Acid Analysis are used to determine sialic acid concentrations in human serum or saliva.
Fig.2 Different strategies for sialic acid analysis. (Zhou, 2020)
CD BioGlyco provides sialic acid analysis services using several efficient strategies. To ensure fast and high-quality project completion, our experts will continuously follow the progress of the project and provide timely guidance. If you are interested in our sialic acid analysis services in breast cancer, please feel free to contact us for more information.
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