意大利特伦托大学Francesco Asnicar和Nicola Segata共同合作，近期取得重要工作进展。他们在来自32个国家的56,989名个体中研究发现，肠道芽囊原虫（Blastocystis）与更健康的饮食和更有利的心脏代谢结果相关。相关研究成果2024年7月8日在线发表于《细胞》杂志上。
据介绍，饮食影响人类健康，影响身体肥胖和患心脏代谢疾病的风险。肠道微生物组是饮食健康轴中的关键参与者，但尽管其细菌部分得到了广泛研究，但包括Blastocystis在内的微真核生物的作用尚未得到充分探索。
研究人员对56989个宏基因组进行了全面分析，结果表明，人类Blastocystis表现出与地理、生活方式和饮食习惯相关的不同流行模式。Blastocystis的存在定义了一种特定的细菌特征，与更有利的心脏代谢特征呈正相关，与肥胖（p＜1e–16）和与肠道生态改变相关的疾病（p＜1 e–8）呈负相关。在一项涉及1124名个体的饮食干预研究中，饮食质量的改善与体重减轻、Blastocystis患病率（p=0.003）和数量增加（p<1e-7）有关。
总之，这一研究结果表明Blastocystis具有潜在的有益作用，这可能有助于解释宿主对饮食的个性化反应和下游疾病的发病机制。
附：英文原文
Title: Intestinal Blastocystis is linked to healthier diets and more favorable cardiometabolic outcomes in 56,989 individuals from 32 countries
Author: Elisa Piperni, Long H. Nguyen, Paolo Manghi, Hanseul Kim, Edoardo Pasolli, Sergio Andreu-Sánchez, Alberto Arrè, Kate M. Bermingham, Aitor Blanco-Míguez, Serena Manara, Mireia Valles-Colomer, Elco Bakker, Fabio Busonero, Richard Davies, Edoardo Fiorillo, Francesca Giordano, George Hadjigeorgiou, Emily R. Leeming, Monia Lobina, Marco Masala, Andrea Maschio, Lauren J. McIver, Mauro Pala, Maristella Pitzalis, Jonathan Wolf, Jingyuan Fu, Alexandra Zhernakova, Simone M. Cacciò, Francesco Cucca, Sarah E. Berry, Danilo Ercolini, Andrew T. Chan, Curtis Huttenhower, Tim D. Spector, Nicola Segata, Francesco Asnicar
Issue&Volume: 2024-07-08
Abstract: Diet impacts human health, influencing body adiposity and the risk of developing cardiometabolic diseases. The gut microbiome is a key player in the diet-health axis, but while its bacterial fraction is widely studied, the role of micro-eukaryotes, including Blastocystis, is underexplored. We performed a global-scale analysis on 56,989 metagenomes and showed that human Blastocystis exhibits distinct prevalence patterns linked to geography, lifestyle, and dietary habits. Blastocystis presence defined a specific bacterial signature and was positively associated with more favorable cardiometabolic profiles and negatively with obesity (p < 1e–16) and disorders linked to altered gut ecology (p < 1e–8). In a diet intervention study involving 1,124 individuals, improvements in dietary quality were linked to weight loss and increases in Blastocystis prevalence (p = 0.003) and abundance (p < 1e–7). Our findings suggest a potentially beneficial role for Blastocystis, which may help explain personalized host responses to diet and downstream disease etiopathogenesis.
DOI: 10.1016/j.cell.2024.06.018
Source: https://www.cell.com/cell/fulltext/S0092-8674(24)00692-5