Fatty Acids and Long Chain Bases of Vertebrate Brain Gangliosides

Abstract

Abstract— Fatty acid and long‐chain base composition of gangliosides from brains of animals belonging to various vertebrate classes (fishes, amphibia, reptiles, birds and mammals) was studied by gas‐liquid chromatography. Stearic acid was found to be the main fatty acid everywhere. Brain gangliosides of cold‐blooded animals contain lesser amounts of stearic and higher amounts of palmitic and monoenoic acids as compared to those of mammals. Long‐chain bases were separated as trimethylsilyl derivatives. Large amounts (23‐48 per cent) of long chain bases with 20 carbon atoms were found in brain gangliosides of mammals while in those of cold‐blooded animals they constitute 3‐12 per cent of the total. The comparison of the composition of gangliosides with that of cerebrosides and sulphatides indicates, that the fatty acid and long chain base composition of gangliosides from mammalian brain differs from that of other glycosphingolipids, whereas in brains of cold‐blooded animals they are much more similar.

Liquid Chromatography–High‐Resolution Mass Spectrometry for Quantitative Analysis of Gangliosides

“…Where more than one charge state existed for a given class of ganglioside, the charge state(s) observed in the greatest intensity were those used for compiling our mass lists. Figure 2d shows an extracted ion spectrum of calibration standard GT 1b displaying prominent species (most likely dC18:1/C18:0 and dC20:1/C18:0) in their -2 and -3 charge states [16]. The charge state(s) selected for each ganglioside class were as follows: ( The excellent specificity of the method allowed us to use it confidently to quantify gangliosides in rat serum samples (extracted using the modified Svennerholm and Fredman extraction protocol where the serum samples were treated the same as homogenised brains), which have proportionally much lower levels of gangliosides than brain extracts (Fig.…”

“…In this study, we used the resolving power of an LTQOrbitrap TM mass spectrometer to extract and sum the major ganglioside species [16,17] present within eight classes of ganglioside (GM 1 , GM 2 , GM 3 , GD 3 , GD 1a , GD 1b , GT 1b , and GQ 1b ) in order to quantitatively determine the amount of these ganglioside classes present in rat brain samples. The advantage of this LC-MS method is its ability to measure eight individual ganglioside classes simultaneously and to give detail on the relative proportions of the molecular species present within each ganglioside class.…”

Evolutionary approach to the analysis of structure and function of gangliosides

“…Thus, in phospholipids such changes were shown for both fatty acids and aldehydes (12,13). However, no statistically significant differences in the degree of saturation of brain ganglioside long chain bases were found when cold and warm-water fishes or representatives of different vertebrate classes were compared (8,14).…”

Gangliosides in Fish Brain

“…In the evolution of vertebrates the degree of ganglioside fatty aeid saturation inereases (AVROVA and ZABELINSKII, 1971). It may be also eonsidered ab thermal adaptation sinee in mammals and birds eell membranes funetion at relatively high temperatures (37-40°C).…”