AUTHOR=Xu YuShuang , Wang YiHua , Li HeWei , Dai Yong , Chen Di , Wang MengMeng , Jiang Xin , Huang ZaoZao , Yu HongLu , Huang JuanJuan , Xiong ZhiFan 

TITLE=Altered Fecal Microbiota Composition in Older Adults With Frailty

JOURNAL=Frontiers in Cellular and Infection Microbiology

VOLUME=11

YEAR=2021

URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/cellular-and-infection-microbiology/articles/10.3389/fcimb.2021.696186

DOI=10.3389/fcimb.2021.696186

ISSN=2235-2988

ABSTRACT=<sec><title>Objective</title><p>Frailty is a common geriatric syndrome that is diagnosed and staged based mainly on symptoms. We aimed to evaluate frailty-related alterations of the intestinal permeability and profile fecal microbiota of healthy and frail older adults to identify microbial biomarkers of this syndrome.</p></sec><sec><title>Methods</title><p>We collected serum and fecal samples from 94 community-dwelling older adults, along with anthropometric, medical, mental health, and lifestyle data. Serum inflammatory cytokines IL-6 and HGMB1 and the intestinal permeability biomarker zonulin were measured using enzyme-linked immunosorbent assays. The 16S rRNA amplicon sequencing method was performed to determine the fecal composition of fecal microbiota. We analyzed the diversity and composition differences of the gut microbiota in the two groups and assessed the relationship between the changes in microbiota structure and clinical biomarkers.</p></sec><sec><title>Results</title><p>Older adults with frailty showed higher concentrations of IL-6, HGMB1, and zonulin. Although there were no statistically significant differences in the diversity index and evenness indices or species richness of fecal microbiota between the two groups, we found significant microbiota structure differences. Compared with the control group, fecal samples from the frail group had higher levels of <italic>Akkermansia</italic>, <italic>Parabacteroides</italic>, and <italic>Klebsiella</italic> and lower levels of the commensal genera <italic>Faecalibacterium</italic>, <italic>Prevotella</italic>, <italic>Roseburia</italic>, <italic>Megamonas</italic>, and <italic>Blautia.</italic> Spearman’s correlation analysis showed that the intergenus interactions were more common in healthy controls than older adults with frailty. <italic>Escherichia</italic>/<italic>Shigella</italic>, <italic>Pyramidobacter</italic>, <italic>Alistipes</italic>, and <italic>Akkermansia</italic> were positively correlated with IL-6, while <italic>Faecalibacterium</italic>, <italic>Prevotella</italic>, and <italic>Roseburia</italic> were negatively correlated with IL-6. <italic>Alistipes</italic> were found to be positively correlated with HGMB1. <italic>Akkermansia</italic> and <italic>Alistipes</italic> were linked to the increased serum level of inflammatory factors and intestinal permeability.</p></sec><sec><title>Conclusions</title><p>Frailty is associated with differences in the composition of fecal microbiota. These findings might aid in the development of probiotics or microbial-based therapies for frailty.</p></sec>