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Updated: Jun 22, 2025
An In Vitro Batch-culture Model to Estimate the Effects of Interventional Regimens on Human Fecal Microbiota
Published on: July 31, 2019
Gut Microbiota, Human Blood Metabolites, and Esophageal Cancer: A Mendelian Randomization Study
Xiuzhi Li1, Bingchen Xu2, Han Yang1
1State Key Laboratory of Oncology in South China, Department of Thoracic Surgery, Sun Yat-sen University Cancer Center, Guangdong Provincial Clinical Research Center for Cancer, Collaborative Innovation Center for Cancer Medicine, Guangzhou 510060, China.
Background:
Unbalances in the gut microbiota have been proposed as a possible cause of esophageal cancer (ESCA), yet the exact causal relationship remains unclear.
Purpose:
To investigate the potential causal relationship between the gut microbiota and ESCA with Mendelian randomization (MR) analysis.
Methods:
Genome-wide association studies (GWASs) of 207 gut microbial taxa (5 phyla, 10 classes, 13 orders, 26 families, 48 genera, and 105 species) and 205 gut microbiota metabolic pathways conducted by the Dutch Microbiome Project (DMP) and a FinnGen cohort GWAS of esophageal cancer specified the summary statistics. To investigate the possibility of a mediation effect between the gut microbiota and ESCA, mediation MR analyses were performed for 1091 blood metabolites and 309 metabolite ratios.
Results:
MR analysis indicated that the relative abundance of 10 gut microbial taxa was associated with ESCA but all the 12 gut microbiota metabolic pathways with ESCA indicated no statistically significant association existing. Two blood metabolites and a metabolite ratio were discovered to be mediating factors in the pathway from gut microbiota to ESCA.
Conclusion:
This research indicated the potential mediating effects of blood metabolites and offered genetic evidence in favor of a causal correlation between gut microbiota and ESCA.
