RETRACTED: Molecular detection of eukaryotes in a single human stool sample from Senegal

Area of Science:

• Microbiology
• Human Gut Microbiome Research
• Eukaryotic Diversity

Background:

• Microbial eukaryotes play diverse roles in the human gut microbiome, ranging from beneficial to parasitic.
• The full diversity of gut eukaryotes remains largely unexplored due to low abundance and limited community-level studies.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate the eukaryotic community composition in a human fecal sample.
• To compare culture-dependent and culture-independent methods for eukaryotic detection.

Main Methods:

• Analysis of a single fecal sample from a healthy African male.
• Utilized both culture-dependent isolation and molecular techniques (18S rRNA and ITS sequencing).
• Employed various primer sets for broad eukaryotic detection.

Main Results:

• Culture-based methods yielded few fungal species (Candida spp., Galactomyces spp., Trichosporon asahii).
• Molecular methods identified a diverse eukaryotic community with 27 species from 977 clones.
• Fungi constituted the majority (73.3%), followed by plant species (19.2%), other micro-eukaryotes (6%), and human sequences (1.5%).

Conclusions:

• A complex eukaryotic community exists in the human gut, with fungi being highly abundant.
• Culture-independent molecular methods are superior for revealing eukaryotic diversity compared to culture-based approaches.
• Further large-scale studies are necessary to understand the roles of these eukaryotes in human health and disease.