Faecal Microbiota Composition Varies between Patients with Breast Cancer and Healthy Women: A Comparative Case-Control Study

Study information

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study design

case-control

Citation

PMID PubMed identifier for scientific articles.

34444865

DOI Digital object identifier for electronic documents.

10.3390/nu13082705

URI Uniform resource identifier for web resources.

Authors

Bobin-Dubigeon C, Luu HT, Leuillet S, Lavergne SN, Carton T, Le Vacon F, Michel C, Nazih H, Bard JM

Journal

Nutrients

Year

2021

Keywords:

16S rRNA, abundance, breast cancer, healthy women, metabarcoding analyses, microbiota, qPCR

The intestinal microbiota plays an essential role in many diseases, such as obesity, irritable bowel disease (IBD), and cancer. This study aimed to characterize the faecal microbiota from early-stage breast cancer (BC) patients and healthy controls. Faeces from newly diagnosed breast cancer patients, mainly for an invasive carcinoma of no specific type (HR+ and HER2-), before any therapeutic treatment and healthy controls were collected for metabarcoding analyses. We show that the Shannon index, used as an index of diversity, was statistically lower in the BC group compared to that of controls. This work highlights a reduction of microbial diversity, a relative enrichment in Firmicutes, as well as a depletion in Bacteroidetes in patients diagnosed with early BC compared to those of healthy women. A tendency towards a decreased relative abundance of Odoribacter sp., Butyricimonas sp., and Coprococcus sp. was observed. This preliminary study suggests that breast cancer patients may differ from healthy subjects in their intestinal bacterial composition.

Experiment 1

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Curated date: 2025/07/15

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Subjects

Location of subjects

France

Host species Species from which microbiome was sampled. Contact us to have more species added.

Homo sapiens

Body site Anatomical site where microbial samples were extracted from according to the Uber Anatomy Ontology

Feces Cow dung,Cow pat,Droppings,Dung,Excrement,Excreta,Faeces,Fecal material,Fecal matter,Fewmet,Frass,Guano,Matières fécales@fr,Merde@fr,Ordure,Partie de la merde@fr,Piece of shit,Porción de mierda@es,Portion of dung,Portion of excrement,Portion of faeces,Portion of fecal material,Portion of fecal matter,Portion of feces,Portion of guano,Portion of scat,Portionem cacas,Scat,Spoor,Spraint,Stool,Teil der fäkalien@de,Feces,feces

Condition The experimental condition / phenotype studied according to the Experimental Factor Ontology

Breast cancer breast cancer,breast tumor,cancer of breast,malignant breast neoplasm,malignant breast tumor,malignant neoplasm of breast,malignant neoplasm of the breast,malignant tumor of breast,malignant tumor of the breast,mammary cancer,mammary neoplasm,mammary tumor,primary breast cancer,Breast cancer

Group 0 name Corresponds to the control (unexposed) group for case-control studies

healthy controls

Group 1 name Corresponds to the case (exposed) group for case-control studies

BC patients

Group 1 definition Diagnostic criteria applied to define the specific condition / phenotype represented in the case (exposed) group

Early-stage breast cancer (BC) patients, with samples taken before any anticancer therapy was started.

Group 0 sample size Number of subjects in the control (unexposed) group

29

Group 1 sample size Number of subjects in the case (exposed) group

25

Antibiotics exclusion Number of days without antibiotics usage (if applicable) and other antibiotics-related criteria used to exclude participants (if any)

Any antibiotic usage was excluded

Lab analysis

Sequencing type

PCR

16S variable region One or more hypervariable region(s) of the bacterial 16S gene

Not specified

Sequencing platform Manufacturer and experimental platform used for quantifying microbial abundance

RT-qPCR

Statistical Analysis

Data transformation Data transformation applied to microbial abundance measurements prior to differential abundance testing (if any).

log transformation

Statistical test

Mann-Whitney (Wilcoxon)

Significance threshold p-value or FDR threshold used for differential abundance testing (if any)

0.05

MHT correction Have statistical tests be corrected for multiple hypothesis testing (MHT)?

No

Signature 1

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Source: Table 3

Description: Relative abundance of specific bacterial groups in stools of BC patients and control group by specific primers per bacteria group /species (qPCR for specific bacterial copy numbers results using wilcoxon test).

Abundance in Group 1: increased abundance in BC patients

NCBI	Quality Control	Links
Bacillota
Clostridium cluster IVClostridium cluster IV
Clostridium cluster XIVaClostridium cluster XIVa
Blautia sp.

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Signature 2

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Source: Table 3

Description: Relative abundance of specific bacterial groups in stools of BC patients and control group by specific primers per bacteria group /species (qPCR for specific bacterial copy numbers results using wilcoxon test).

Abundance in Group 1: decreased abundance in BC patients

NCBI	Quality Control	Links
Bacteroidota

Revision editor(s): Ecsharp

Experiment 2

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Differences from previous experiment shown

Subjects

Group 0 sample size Number of subjects in the control (unexposed) group

30

Lab analysis

Sequencing type

16S

16S variable region One or more hypervariable region(s) of the bacterial 16S gene

V3-V4

Sequencing platform Manufacturer and experimental platform used for quantifying microbial abundance

Illumina

Statistical Analysis

Data transformation Data transformation applied to microbial abundance measurements prior to differential abundance testing (if any).

Not specified

Statistical test

ANOVA

Confounders controlled for Confounding factors that have been accounted for by stratification or model adjustment

age

Alpha Diversity

Shannon Estimator of species richness and species evenness: more weight on species richness

decreased

Chao1 Abundance-based estimator of species richness

unchanged

Signature 1

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Source: Figure 3b & 3.2.2. V3–V4 16S r RNA Gene Sequencing bullet #2

Description: Barplots of relative abundances at the phylum level for individual data from Figure 3b and text excerpt with MHT adjusted p-values from text.

Abundance in Group 1: increased abundance in BC patients

NCBI	Quality Control	Links
Bacillota

Revision editor(s): Ecsharp

Signature 2

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Curated date: 2025/07/15

Curator: Ecsharp

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Source: Figure 3b & 3.2.2. V3–V4 16S r RNA Gene Sequencing bullet #2

Description: Barplots of relative abundances at the phylum level for individual data from Figure 3b and text excerpt with MHT adjusted p-values from text.

Abundance in Group 1: decreased abundance in BC patients

NCBI	Quality Control	Links
Bacteroidota

Revision editor(s): Ecsharp