Department of Nutrition and Food Hygiene, Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Tropical Disease Research, School of Public Health, Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, China; Department of Clinical Nutrition, Huazhong University of Science and Technology Union Shenzhen Hospital, Shenzhen, China.
Department of Child Health Care, Guangzhou Women and Children's Medical Center, Guangzhou Medical University, Guangzhou, China.
Clin Nutr. 2021 May;40(5):3379-3390. doi: 10.1016/j.clnu.2020.11.014. Epub 2020 Nov 20.
BACKGROUND & AIMS: Previous studies linking the gut microbiome with childhood obesity largely used the body mass index to measure obesity and reached inconsistent findings. Little evidence has linked the gut microbiome to regional body fat deposition. We investigated whether the abundance of specific taxa in the gut microbiota and the concentrations of short-chain fatty acids (SCFAs) were associated with the content and regional deposition of body fat in children.
This cross-sectional study involved 236 children aged 6-9 years. The fat mass contents/percentages in the total body and the android, gynoid, and limb regions were determined by dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry, and the android-to-gynoid fat mass ratio and fat-to-lean mass ratios were calculated. Fecal samples were subjected to16S rRNA amplicon sequencing, and the fecal SCFA concentrations were quantified via high-performance liquid chromatography.
A weighted gene co-expression network analysis identified seven modules of co-expressed operational taxonomic units (OTUs). A total of 57 OTUs from 4 key modules were selected for further analysis. After adjustment of covariates and controlling for the false discovery rate (FDR), a multiple linear regression analysis revealed significant correlations of the abundances of some OTUs with obesity and body fat measures. For instance, the OTUs classified to the species Ruminococcus gnavus and Flavonifractor plautii showed significant negative correlations with the total and regional body fat (β: -0.250 to -0.180, P: 0.041-0.049), whereas OTUs belonging to the genera Blautia and Romboutsia exhibited positive correlations with body fat measures (β: 0.184-0.222, P: 0.041-0.049). The fecal concentrations of acetic, propionic, and butyric acids and total SCFAs were significantly positively correlated with various parameters of body fat distribution (β: 0.160-0.275, P: <0.001-0.042).
The gut microbiome and SCFAs are significantly associated with obesity and body fat distribution in pediatric population.
先前将肠道微生物组与儿童肥胖联系起来的研究主要使用体重指数来衡量肥胖，得出的结果并不一致。很少有证据表明肠道微生物组与局部体脂肪沉积有关。我们调查了肠道微生物群中特定分类群的丰度和短链脂肪酸（SCFA）的浓度是否与儿童体内脂肪含量和区域沉积有关。
这项横断面研究纳入了 236 名 6-9 岁的儿童。通过双能 X 射线吸收法测定全身和安卓、女性型和肢体区域的脂肪含量/百分比，并计算安卓-女性型脂肪质量比和脂肪-瘦肉质量比。对粪便样本进行 16S rRNA 扩增子测序，并通过高效液相色谱法定量粪便 SCFA 浓度。
加权基因共表达网络分析确定了七个共表达操作分类单元（OTU）模块。选择 4 个关键模块中的 57 个 OTU 进行进一步分析。调整协变量并控制假发现率（FDR）后，多元线性回归分析显示，一些 OTU 的丰度与肥胖和体脂测量值呈显著相关性。例如，分类为瘤胃球菌和普氏拟杆菌的 OTU 与全身和局部体脂肪呈显著负相关（β：-0.250 至-0.180，P：0.041-0.049），而属于布劳特氏菌和罗姆布茨氏菌的 OTU 与体脂测量值呈正相关（β：0.184-0.222，P：0.041-0.049）。粪便中乙酸、丙酸和丁酸以及总 SCFA 的浓度与体脂分布的各种参数呈显著正相关（β：0.160-0.275，P：<0.001-0.042）。
肠道微生物组和 SCFA 与儿科人群的肥胖和体脂分布显著相关。
