ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Cell. Infect. Microbiol.
Sec. Intestinal Microbiome
This article is part of the Research TopicGut Microbiota and Age-Related Disorders: From Mechanisms to TherapiesView all 9 articles
The Analysis of Gut Microbiota Characteristics in Children with Global Developmental Delay
Provisionally accepted
- 1Department of Clinical Medicine, Guangzhou Medical University, Guangzhou, China
- 2Shenzhen Longgang District Maternal and Child Health Care Hospital, Shenzhen, China
- 3First Affiliated Hospital of Guangzhou Medical University, Guangzhou, Guangdong Province, China
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Word count: 306 Objective: To explore the composition and functional changes of gut microbiota in children with Global Developmental Delay(GDD),and to explore the role of gut microbiota in the pathogenesis of GDD using high-throughput sequencing.Methods: A prospective study was conducted to select 26 children diagnosed with GDD at Longgang District Maternal and Child HealthCare Hospital of Shenzhen City from January 2024 to December 2024 as the disease group(GDD), and 59 healthy children of the same age were selected as the healthy group(HC).General information of the children was collected through a questionnaire survey, and fecal samples from all participants were collected. Total DNA was extracted and amplified, and high-throughput sequencing of the 16S rRNA gene was performed for biological analysis of the sequencing results.Results:The alpha diversity analysis revealed a significant reduction in microbial diversity in the GDD group (Chao1 index, P = 0.007), while the beta diversity showed significant segregation between groups (R² = 0.067, P = 0.001);At the phylum level, the relative abundance of Actinobacteria was significantly increased (P < 0.01), while the abundance of Bacteroidetes was significantly decreased (P < 0.05) in the GDD group;At the genus level, the abundance of Bifidobacterium, Fusicatenibacter, and Erysipelatoclostridium were significantly increased in the GDD group (all P < 0.001), while the abundance of Faecalibacterium, Phascolarctobacterium, and Alistipes were significantly reduced (all P < 0.001);Functional prediction based on 16S rRNA data suggested potential differences in microbial metabolic pathways, including mRNA surveillance, proteasome, and atrazine degradation, in the GDD group. These findings hypothesize a functional shift in the gut microbiome associated with GDD, which requires validation by direct metagenomic or metabolomic methods.Conclusion:Children with GDD have significant differences in gut microbiota composition and diversity compared to HC,and the abundance and abnormal metabolic pathway may be closely related to the neuroinflammatory process, suggesting that intestinal microecological regulation may become a new intervention target for GDD.
Keywords: 16S rDNA, Characteristics, Global Developmental Delay (GDD), Gut Microbiota, high-throughput sequencing
Received: 05 Apr 2025; Accepted: 02 Dec 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Wan, Congfu, Kong, Li and Lu. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Chengyu Lu
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