Gut microbiota is associated with bone mineral density : an observational and genome-wide environmental interaction analysis in the UK Biobank cohort.

AIMS

Despite the interest in the association of gut microbiota with bone health, limited population-based studies of gut microbiota and bone mineral density (BMD) have been made. Our aim is to explore the possible association between gut microbiota and BMD.

METHODS

A total of 3,321 independent loci of gut microbiota were used to calculate the individual polygenic risk score (PRS) for 114 gut microbiota-related traits. The individual genotype data were obtained from UK Biobank cohort. Linear regressions were then conducted to evaluate the possible association of gut microbiota with L1-L4 BMD (n = 4,070), total BMD (n = 4,056), and femur total BMD (n = 4,054), respectively. PLINK 2.0 was used to detect the single-nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) × gut microbiota interaction effect on the risks of L1-L4 BMD, total BMD, and femur total BMD, respectively.

RESULTS

We detected five, three, and seven candidate gut microbiota-related traits for L1-L4 BMD, total BMD, and femur BMD, respectively, such as (p = 0.004) for L1-L4 BMD, and (p = 0.046) for total BMD. We also detected two common gut microbiota-related traits shared by L1-L4 BMD, total BMD, and femur total BMD, including and . Interaction analysis of BMD detected several genes that interacted with gut microbiota, such as phospholipase D1 () and endomucin () interacting with in total BMD, and and Discs Large MAGUK Scaffold Protein 2 () interacting with in femur BMD.

CONCLUSION

Our results suggest associations between gut microbiota and BMD, which will be helpful to further explore the regulation mechanism and intervention gut microbiota of BMD. Cite this article:  2021;10(11):734-741.