Towards large-cohort comparative studies to define the factors influencing the gut microbial community structure of ASD patients

doi:10.3402/mehd.v26.26555

Title: Towards large-cohort comparative studies to define the factors influencing the gut microbial community structure of ASD patients

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Abstract

Differences in the gut microbiota have been reported between individuals with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) and neurotypical controls, although direct evidence that changes in the microbiome contribute to causing ASD has been scarce to date. Here we summarize some considerations of experimental design that can help untangle causality in this complex system. In particular, large cross-sectional studies that can factor out important variables such as diet, prospective longitudinal studies that remove some of the influence of interpersonal variation in the microbiome (which is generally high, especially in children), and studies transferring microbial communities into germ-free mice may be especially useful. Controlling for the effects of technical variables, which have complicated efforts to combine existing studies, is critical when biological effect sizes are small. Large citizen-science studies with thousands of participants such as the American Gut Project have been effective at uncovering subtle microbiome effects in self-collected samples and with self-reported diet and behavior data, and may provide a useful complement to other types of traditionally funded and conducted studies in the case of ASD, especially in the hypothesis generation phase.

Authors:

McDonald, Daniel ^[1]; Hornig, Mady ^[2]; Lozupone, Catherine ^[3]; Debelius, Justine ^[1]; Gilbert, Jack A. ^[4]; Knight, Rob ^[5]

Univ. of Colorado, Boulder, CO (United States)
Columbia Univ. Mailman School of Public Health, New York, NY (United States)
Univ. of Colorado Denver, Aurora, CO (United States)
Argonne National Lab. (ANL), Argonne, IL (United States); Univ. of Chicago, Chicago, IL (United States); Marine Biological Lab., Woods Hole, MA (United States); Zhejiang Univ., Hangzhou (China)
Univ. of Colorado, Boulder, CO (United States); Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Boulder, CO (United States)

Publication Date:: Mon Mar 09 00:00:00 EDT 2015

Research Org.:: Argonne National Lab. (ANL), Argonne, IL (United States)

Sponsoring Org.:: USDOE

OSTI Identifier:: 1209267

Grant/Contract Number:: AC02-06CH11357

Resource Type:: Journal Article: Accepted Manuscript

Journal Name:: Microbial Ecology in Health and Disease (Online)

Additional Journal Information:: Journal Name: Microbial Ecology in Health and Disease (Online); Journal Volume: 26; Journal ID: ISSN 1651-2235

Publisher:: Co-Action Publishing

Country of Publication:: United States

Language:: English

Subject:: 59 BASIC BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES; autism; microbiology; microbiome; neurological

Citation Formats


                    McDonald, Daniel, Hornig, Mady, Lozupone, Catherine, Debelius, Justine, Gilbert, Jack A., and Knight, Rob. Towards large-cohort comparative studies to define the factors influencing the gut microbial community structure of ASD patients.  United States: N. p., 2015. 
        Web.  doi:10.3402/mehd.v26.26555.

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                    McDonald, Daniel, Hornig, Mady, Lozupone, Catherine, Debelius, Justine, Gilbert, Jack A., & Knight, Rob. Towards large-cohort comparative studies to define the factors influencing the gut microbial community structure of ASD patients.  United States.  doi:10.3402/mehd.v26.26555.

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                    McDonald, Daniel, Hornig, Mady, Lozupone, Catherine, Debelius, Justine, Gilbert, Jack A., and Knight, Rob. Mon .  
        "Towards large-cohort comparative studies to define the factors influencing the gut microbial community structure of ASD patients".  United States.  
        doi:10.3402/mehd.v26.26555.  https://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/1209267.

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@article{osti_1209267,

  title        = {Towards large-cohort comparative studies to define the factors influencing the gut microbial community structure of ASD patients},

  author       = {McDonald, Daniel and Hornig, Mady and Lozupone, Catherine and Debelius, Justine and Gilbert, Jack A. and Knight, Rob},

  abstractNote = {Differences in the gut microbiota have been reported between individuals with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) and neurotypical controls, although direct evidence that changes in the microbiome contribute to causing ASD has been scarce to date. Here we summarize some considerations of experimental design that can help untangle causality in this complex system. In particular, large cross-sectional studies that can factor out important variables such as diet, prospective longitudinal studies that remove some of the influence of interpersonal variation in the microbiome (which is generally high, especially in children), and studies transferring microbial communities into germ-free mice may be especially useful. Controlling for the effects of technical variables, which have complicated efforts to combine existing studies, is critical when biological effect sizes are small. Large citizen-science studies with thousands of participants such as the American Gut Project have been effective at uncovering subtle microbiome effects in self-collected samples and with self-reported diet and behavior data, and may provide a useful complement to other types of traditionally funded and conducted studies in the case of ASD, especially in the hypothesis generation phase.},

  doi          = {10.3402/mehd.v26.26555},

  journal      = {Microbial Ecology in Health and Disease (Online)},

  number       = ,

  volume       = 26,

  place        = {United States},

  year         = {Mon Mar 09 00:00:00 EDT 2015},

  month        = {Mon Mar 09 00:00:00 EDT 2015}

}

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