High-throughput analysis of sulfatides in cerebrospinal fluid using automated extraction and UPLC-MS/MS

Sulfatides (STs) are a group of glycosphingolipids that are highly expressed in brain. Due to their importance for normal brain function and their potential involvement in neurological diseases, development of accurate and sensitive methods for their determination is needed. Here we describe a high-throughput oriented and quantitative method for the determination of STs in cerebrospinal fluid (CSF). The STs were extracted using a fully automated liquid/liquid extraction method and quantified using ultra-performance liquid chromatography coupled to tandem mass spectrometry. With the high sensitivity of the developed method, quantification of 20 ST species from only 100 μl of CSF was performed. Validation of the method showed that the STs were extracted with high recovery (90%) and could be determined with low inter- and intra-day variation. Our method was applied to a patient cohort of subjects with an Alzheimer’s disease biomarker profile. Although the total ST levels were unaltered compared with an age-matched control group, we show that the ratio of hydroxylated/nonhydroxylated STs was increased in the patient cohort. In conclusion, we believe that the fast, sensitive, and accurate method described in this study is a powerful new tool for the determination of STs in clinical as well as preclinical settings.