AUTHOR=Ling Zongxin , Cheng Yiwen , Yan Xiumei , Shao Li , Liu Xia , Zhou Dajin , Zhang Lijuan , Yu Kunqiang , Zhao Longyou TITLE=Alterations of the Fecal Microbiota in Chinese Patients With Multiple Sclerosis JOURNAL=Frontiers in Immunology VOLUME=11 YEAR=2020 URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/immunology/articles/10.3389/fimmu.2020.590783 DOI=10.3389/fimmu.2020.590783 ISSN=1664-3224 ABSTRACT=
Mounting evidence indicates that alterations in the intestinal microbiota may be associated with neurological disorders such as multiple sclerosis (MS). MS is a putative autoimmune disease of the central nervous system. However, it has not been determined whether the intestinal microbiota and host immune status are altered in Chinese patients with stable MS. In our study, 22 Chinese patients with stable MS and 33 healthy controls were enrolled for fecal microbiota analysis and host immunity evaluation. The microbial diversity and composition, bacterial co-occurrence correlations, predictive functional profiles, and microbiota-cytokine correlations between the two groups were compared. We observed that while the overall structure of the fecal microbiota did not change significantly, the abundances of several key functional bacteria, primarily