Aberrant
protein N-glycosylation is a cancer hallmark,
which has great potential for cancer detection. However, large-scale
and in-depth analysis of N-glycosylation remains
challenging because of its high heterogeneity, complexity, and low
abundance. Human saliva is an attractive diagnostic body fluid, while
few efforts explored its N-glycoproteome for lung
cancer. Here, we utilized a zwitterionic–hydrophilic interaction
chromatography-based strategy to specifically enrich salivary glycopeptides.
Through quantitative proteomics analysis, 1492 and 1234 intact N-glycopeptides were confidently identified from pooled
saliva samples of 10 subjects in the nonsmall-cell lung cancer group
and 10 subjects in the normal control group. Accordingly, 575 and
404 N-glycosites were revealed for the lung cancer
group and normal control group. In particular, 154 N-glycosites and 259 site-specific glycoforms were significantly dysregulated
in the lung cancer group. Several N-glycosites located
at the same glycoprotein and glycans attached to the same N-glycosites were observed with differential expressions,
including haptoglobin, Mucin-5B, lactotransferrin, and α-1-acid
glycoprotein 1. These N-glycoproteins were mainly
related to inflammatory responses, infectious diseases, and cancers.
Our study achieved comprehensive characterization of salivary N-glycoproteome, and dysregulated site-specific glycoforms
hold promise for noninvasive detection of lung cancer.