Serum protein electrophoresis is widely used in clinical laboratories to measure the relative abundance of each obtained fraction. Moreover, we found that the migration time of the γ-globulin fraction can be reproducibly determined (CV = 1.1%). Immunoglobulins were purified from serum using protein l-agarose and theirN-glycosylation was studied using CE on a DNA sequencer. Liver fibrosis patients showed a lower level of sialylation and this moderately correlates with the migration time of the γ-globulins (r= 0.2–0.4). This allowed us to differentiate healthy individuals from these patients with an acceptable diagnostic accuracy (area under the curve = 0.75). This glycomics approach could become a significant added value to a daily, routine clinical test.
