Immune-microbiome coordination defines interferon setpoints in healthy humans

Area of Science:

• Immunology
• Microbiome research
• Human health

Background:

• Human immune system variability is substantial, with non-genetic factors playing a major role.
• The gut microbiome significantly influences the immune system, but its connection to baseline immune states in healthy individuals is not fully understood.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate the relationship between immune system states and the gut microbiome in healthy humans.
• To identify coordinated variations between immune responses and microbiome features using multi-omic profiling.

Main Methods:

• Multi-omic profiling of 110 healthy participants.
• Factor-based integrative analysis to identify coordinated variations.
• Longitudinal data collection over more than a year.

Main Results:

• The interferon response was identified as a highly variable immune feature in healthy individuals.
• Microbiome composition, pathways, and stool metabolites showed coordinated variation with interferon response pathways.
• These parameters demonstrated significant stability within individuals over the study period.

Conclusions:

• The study provides extensive data on the interplay between immune states and the gut microbiome in healthy individuals at steady state.
• Findings pave the way for understanding inter-individual differences in disease susceptibility and therapy response.