Breast cancer but not the menopausal status is associated with small changes of the gut microbiota

Study information

Reviewed Marked as Reviewed by Svetlana up on 2024-6-13

study design

case-control

Citation

PMID PubMed identifier for scientific articles.

38327745

DOI Digital object identifier for electronic documents.

10.3389/fonc.2024.1279132

URI

Authors

Zeber-Lubecka N, Kulecka M, Jagiełło-Gruszfeld A, Dąbrowska M, Kluska A, Piątkowska M, Bagińska K, Głowienka M, Surynt P, Tenderenda M, Mikula M, Ostrowski J

Journal

Frontiers in oncology

Year

2024

Keywords:

breast cancer, gut dysbiosis, menopausal status, microbiome, shotgun

BACKGROUND: Possible relationships between gut dysbiosis and breast cancer (BC) development and progression have been previously reported. However, the results of these metagenomics studies are inconsistent. Our study involved 88 patients diagnosed with breast cancer and 86 cancer-free control women. Participants were divided into groups based on their menopausal status. Fecal samples were collected from 47 and 41 pre- and postmenopausal newly diagnosed breast cancer patients and 51 and 35 pre- and postmenopausal controls, respectively. In this study, we performed shotgun metagenomic analyses to compare the gut microbial community between pre- and postmenopausal BC patients and the corresponding controls. RESULTS: Firstly, we identified 12, 64, 158, and 455 bacterial taxa on the taxonomy level of phyla, families, genera, and species, respectively. Insignificant differences of the Shannon index and β-diversity were found at the genus and species levels between pre- and postmenopausal controls; the differences concerned only the Chao index at the species level. No differences in α-diversity indexes were found between pre- and postmenopausal BC patients, although β-diversity differed these subgroups at the genus and species levels. Consistently, only the abundance of single taxa differed between pre- and postmenopausal controls and cases, while the abundances of 14 and 23 taxa differed or tended to differ between premenopausal cases and controls, and between postmenopausal cases and controls, respectively. There were similar differences in the distribution of enterotypes. Of 460 bacterial MetaCyc pathways discovered, no pathways differentiated pre- and postmenopausal controls or BC patients, while two and one pathways differentiated cases from controls in the pre- and postmenopausal subgroups, respectively. CONCLUSION: While our findings did not reveal an association of changes in the overall microbiota composition and selected taxa with the menopausal status in cases and controls, they confirmed differences of the gut microbiota between pre- and postmenopausal BC patients and the corresponding controls. However, these differences were less extensive than those described previously.

Experiment 1

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Reviewed Marked as Reviewed by Svetlana up on 2024-6-13

Curated date: 2024/03/24

Curator: Keamy

Revision editor(s): Keamy, Scholastica

Subjects

Location of subjects: Poland

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: pre-menopausal controls

Group 1 name Corresponds to the case (exposed) group for case-control studies: pre-menopausal breast cancer (BC) patients

Group 1 definition Diagnostic criteria applied to define the specific condition / phenotype represented in the case (exposed) group: Newly diagnosed pre- or perimenopausal breast cancer patients at the Maria Sklodowska-Curie National Research Institute of Oncology.

Group 0 sample size Number of subjects in the control (unexposed) group: 51

Group 1 sample size Number of subjects in the case (exposed) group: 47

Antibiotics exclusion Number of days without antibiotics usage (if applicable) and other antibiotics-related criteria used to exclude participants (if any): 2 months

Lab analysis

Sequencing type: WMS

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: Illumina

Statistical Analysis

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

Statistical test: Linear Regression

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)?: Yes

Alpha Diversity

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

Chao1 Abundance-based estimator of species richness: unchanged

Signature 1

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Curated date: 2024/03/31

Curator: Keamy

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Source: Table 3

Description: Taxa differentiating premenopausal breast cancer (BC) patients from premenopausal controls assessed using the LInear model for Differential Abundance (LINDA) method for compositional data

Abundance in Group 1: increased abundance in pre-menopausal breast cancer (BC) patients

NCBI	Quality Control	Links
Actinomycetaceae
Actinomycetota
Anaeromassilibacillus
Bifidobacteriaceae
Bifidobacterium
Coriobacteriaceae
Eggerthellaceae
Gemmiger
Gemmiger formicilis
Ruthenibacterium
[Collinsella] massiliensis

Revision editor(s): Keamy, Scholastica

Experiment 2

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Curated date: 2024/03/30

Curator: Keamy

Revision editor(s): Keamy, Scholastica

Differences from previous experiment shown

Subjects

Group 0 name Corresponds to the control (unexposed) group for case-control studies: post-menopausal controls

Group 1 name Corresponds to the case (exposed) group for case-control studies: post-menopausal BC patients

Group 1 definition Diagnostic criteria applied to define the specific condition / phenotype represented in the case (exposed) group: Newly diagnosed postmenopausal breast cancer patients at the Maria Sklodowska-Curie National Research Institute of Oncology.

Group 0 sample size Number of subjects in the control (unexposed) group: 35

Group 1 sample size Number of subjects in the case (exposed) group: 41

Lab analysis

Statistical Analysis

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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Curated date: 2024/03/31

Curator: Keamy

Revision editor(s): Keamy, Scholastica

Source: Table 4

Description: Taxa differentiating postmenopausal breast cancer (BC) patients from postmenopausal controls assessed using the Linear model for Differential Abundance (LINDA) method for compositional data

Abundance in Group 1: increased abundance in post-menopausal BC patients

NCBI	Quality Control	Links
Agathobaculum
Collinsella intestinalis
Harryflintia
Micrococcaceae

Revision editor(s): Keamy, Scholastica

Signature 2

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Reviewed Marked as Reviewed by Svetlana up on 2024-6-13

Curated date: 2024/03/31

Curator: Keamy

Revision editor(s): Keamy, Scholastica

Source: Table 4

Description: Taxa differentiating postmenopausal breast cancer (BC) patients from postmenopausal controls assessed using the Linear model for Differential Abundance (LINDA) method for compositional data

Abundance in Group 1: decreased abundance in post-menopausal BC patients

NCBI	Quality Control	Links
Bacteroides thetaiotaomicron
Barnesiellaceae
Blautia obeum
Coprobacter
Coprobacter fastidiosus
Dorea
Parabacteroides
Parabacteroides distasonis
Phascolarctobacterium faecium

Revision editor(s): Keamy, Scholastica