A Multi-Cohort Study of Immunoglobulin G Glycans in Newly Diagnosed Inflammatory Bowel Disease Patients Reveals Accelerated Biological Aging

Background and AimsAlterations in immunoglobulin G (IgG) N-glycosylation are implicated in inflammatory bowel disease (IBD); however, the robustness of IgG glycan signatures across IBD cohorts with diverse demographics and geographic origins remains underexplored. We aimed to determine whether compositional data analysis (CoDA) and machine learning (ML) can identify IBD-related IgG N-glycan signatures and whether these signatures capture disease-associated acceleration of biological aging. MethodsWe analyzed the IgG glycome profiles of 1,367 plasma samples collected from healthy controls (HC), symptomatic controls (SC), and people with newly diagnosed Crohns (CD), and ulcerative colitis (UC) across four cohorts (UK, Italy, United States, and Netherlands). IgG glycosylation was analyzed by ultra-high-performance liquid chromatography, yielding 24 total-area-normalized glycan peaks (GPs). Analyses were performed using cross-sectional data obtained at baseline. CoDA-powered association analyses were used to identify disease-related effects on GPs while controlling for demographic covariates. ML models were trained and evaluated to assess generalizability to unseen cohorts and demographic subgroups, with a focus on discrimination and reliability. ResultsAcross all cohorts, people with IBD demonstrated accelerated biological aging as quantified by the GlycanAge index. This was accompanied by consistent reductions in IgG galactosylation, with effects partially modulated by age. Classification models trained on glycomics and demographics achieved robust discrimination (AUROC{approx}0.80) between non-IBD (HC+SC) and IBD across cohorts. ConclusionThese findings reveal accelerated biological aging in people with IBD and support the translational potential of IgG glycans as biomarkers and a novel route toward clinically interpretable personalized risk estimates.