title: Human articular cartilage proteoglycans are not undersulfated in osteoarthritis.
abstract: Chondroitin sulfate is the major constituent of cartilage. Inadequate sulfate availability results in the production of undersulfated proteoglycans. In osteoarthritis, there is a net loss of articular cartilage proteoglycans. Theoretically, it is possible that during the progress of disease undersulfated glycosaminoglycans are synthesized producing proteoglycans with poorer biological properties. In this study, we tested whether in early human osteoarthritic articular cartilage (Mankin's score of 2 and 3) or more advanced disease (Mankin's score over 3), there are proteoglycans that contain a higher relative amount of nonsulfated chondroitin disaccharide isomer in their chondroitin sulfate chains by analyzing the molar ratios of chondroitin sulfate disaccharide isoforms with fluorophore-assisted carbohydrate electrophoresis. Our results indicated that the nonsulfated disaccharide of chondroitin sulfate formed in average only 1-2% of the total chondroitin sulfate. More important, the molar ratio of nonsulfated disaccharide did not appear to be increased in the osteoarthritic articular cartilage. We conclude that undersulfation of articular cartilage proteoglycans is not present in the human osteoarthritic joint.
authors: Institute of Biomedicine, Department of Anatomy, University of Kuopio, Kuopio, Finland.
authors: Cheng-Juan
authors: CJ
authors: Qu
authors: Jarno
authors: J
authors: Rieppo
authors: Mika M
authors: MM
authors: Hyttinen
authors: Mikko J
authors: MJ
authors: Lammi
authors: Ilkka
authors: I
authors: Kiviranta
authors: Jatta
authors: J
authors: Kurkijärvi
authors: Jukka S
authors: JS
authors: Jurvelin
authors: Juha
authors: J
authors: Töyräs
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D002358:Cartilage, Articular / Q000378:metabolism*; D002809:Chondroitin Sulfates / Q000378:metabolism*; D004187:Disaccharides / Q000032:analysis; D006801:Humans; D008875:Middle Aged; D020370:Osteoarthritis, Knee / Q000378:metabolism*; D011509:Proteoglycans / Q000737:chemistry / Q000378:metabolism*; D013463:Sulfuric Acid Esters / Q000032:analysis
chemical_list: D004187:Disaccharides; D011509:Proteoglycans; D013463:Sulfuric Acid Esters; D002809:Chondroitin Sulfates