Xudong Wang

This study investigated the relationship between vaginal microbiota and women’s health conditions in 95 Chinese pregnant women in their third trimester. We conducted vaginal metagenomic analysis, examining species, functional pathways, and genes, and utilized correlation and LEfSe analyses to link microbiota to health conditions. Results revealed that healthy participants exhibited higher levels of Lactobacillus iners, with its abundance associated with tetrahydrofolate biosynthesis pathways. They also possessed more glycosyltransferase and ErmB antibiotic resistance genes compared to women with diagnosed conditions. Comparative genomics demonstrated that L. iners strains linked to bacterial vaginosis (BV) possessed more genes encoding biofilm-associated YhgE/Pip domain-containing proteins than healthy-associated strains. Notably, three BV-associated L. iners strains exhibited stronger biofilm formation abilities than four healthy-associated strains isolated in this study. Also, four out of seven L. iners strains inhibited the growth of Gardnerella vaginalis. Overall, L. iners may help maintain vaginal ecosystem stability in Chinese pregnant women.

Gut microbiome plays a significant role in longevity, and dysbiosis is indeed one of the hallmarks of aging. However, the causal relationship between gut microbiota and human longevity or aging remains elusive. Our study assessed the causal relationships between gut microbiome and longevity using Mendelian Randomization (MR). Summary statistics for the gut microbiome were obtained from four genome-wide association study (GWAS) meta-analysis of the MiBioGen consortium (N = 18,340), Dutch Microbiome Project (N = 7738), German individuals (N = 8956), and Finland individuals (N = 5959). Summary statistics for Longevity were obtained from Five GWAS meta-analysis, including Human healthspan (N = 300,447), Longevity (N = 36,745), Lifespans (N = 1,012,240), Parental longevity (N = 389,166), and Frailty (one of the primary aging-linked physiological hallmarks, N = 175,226). Our findings reveal several noteworthy associations, including a negative correlation between Bacteroides massiliensis and longevity, whereas the genus Subdoligranulum and Alistipes, as well as species Alistipes senegalensis and Alistipes shahii, exhibited positive associations with specific longevity traits. Moreover, the microbial pathway of coenzyme A biosynthesis I, pyruvate fermentation to acetate and lactate II, and pentose phosphate pathway exhibited positive associations with two or more traits linked to longevity. Conversely, the TCA cycle VIII (helicobacter) pathway consistently demonstrated a negative correlation with lifespan and parental longevity. Our findings of this MR study indicated many significant associations between gut microbiome and longevity. These microbial taxa and pathways may potentially play a protective role in promoting longevity or have a suppressive effect on lifespan.

Gut microbiome plays a pivotal role in combating diseases and facilitating healthy aging, and natural products derived from biosynthetic gene clusters (BGCs) of the human microbiome exhibit significant biological activities. However, the natural products of the gut microbiome in long-lived populations remain poorly understood. Here, we integrated six cohorts of long-lived populations, encompassing a total of 1029 fecal metagenomic samples, and employed the metagenomic single sample assembled BGCs (MSSA-BGCs) analysis pipeline to investigate the natural products and their associated species. Our findings reveal that the BGC composition of the extremely long-lived group differed significantly from that of younger elderly and young individuals across five cohorts. Terpene and Type I PKS BGCs were enriched in the extremely long-lived, whereas cyclic-lactone-autoinducer BGCs were more prevalent in the young. Association analysis indicated that terpene BGCs were strongly associated with the abundance of Akkermansia muciniphila, which was also more abundant in the long-lived elderly across at least three cohorts. We assembled 18 A. muciniphila draft genomes using metagenomic data from the extremely long-lived group across six cohorts and discovered that they all harbor two classes of terpene BGCs, which aligns with the 97 complete genomes of A. muciniphila strains retrieved from the NCBI database. The core domains of these two BGC classes are squalene/phytoene synthases involved in the biosynthesis of tri- and tetraterpenes. Furthermore, the abundance of fecal A. muciniphila was significantly associated with eight types of triterpenoids. Targeted terpenoid metabolomic analysis revealed that two triterpenoids, Holstinone C and colubrinic acid, were enriched in the A. muciniphila culture solution compared to the medium, thereby confirming the production of triterpenoids by A. muciniphila. The natural products derived from the gut of long-lived populations provide intriguing indications of their potential beneficial roles in regulating health.

E. coli is the etiological agent of environmental mastitis in dairy cows, which causes massive financial losses worldwide. However, the pathophysiological role of YeaJ in the interaction between E. coli and host remains unclear.