AUTHOR=Huang Kaikai , Li Fang , Liu Yingyao , Liang Baoying , Qu Pinghua , Yang Linlin , Han Shanshan , Li Wenjun , Mo Xiumei , Dong Lei , Lin Ying 

TITLE=Multi-omics analyses reveal interactions between the skin microbiota and skin metabolites in atopic dermatitis

JOURNAL=Frontiers in Microbiology

VOLUME=15

YEAR=2024

URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/microbiology/articles/10.3389/fmicb.2024.1349674

DOI=10.3389/fmicb.2024.1349674

ISSN=1664-302X

ABSTRACT=<sec id="sec1"><title>Introduction</title><p>Atopic dermatitis (AD) is one of the most common inflammatory skin diseases. Skin microecological imbalance is an important factor in the pathogenesis of AD, but the underlying mechanism of its interaction with humans remains unclear.</p></sec><sec id="sec2"><title>Methods</title><p>16S rRNA gene sequencing was conducted to reveal the skin microbiota dynamics. Changes in skin metabolites were tracked by LC–MS metabolomics. We then explored the potential mechanism of interaction by analyzing the correlation between skin bacterial communities and metabolites in corresponding skin-associated samples.</p></sec><sec id="sec3"><title>Results</title><p>Samples from 18 AD patients and 18 healthy volunteers (HVs) were subjected to 16S rRNA gene sequencing and LC–MS metabolomics. AD patients had dysbiosis of the skin bacterial community with decreased species richness and evenness. The relative abundance of the genus <italic>Staphylococcus</italic> increased significantly in AD, while the abundances of the genera <italic>Propionibacterium</italic> and <italic>Brevundimonas</italic> decreased significantly. The relative abundance of the genera <italic>Staphylococcus</italic> in healthy females was significantly higher than those in healthy males, while it showed no difference in AD patients with or without lesions. The effects of AD status, sex and the presence or absence of rashes on the number of differentially abundant metabolites <italic>per capita</italic> were successively reduced. Multiple metabolites involved in purine metabolism and phenylalanine metabolism pathways (such as xanthosine/xanthine and L-phenylalanine/trans-cinnamate) were increased in AD patients. These trends were much more obvious between female AD patients and female HVs. Spearman correlation analysis revealed that the genus <italic>Staphylococcus</italic> was positively correlated with various compounds involved in phenylalanine metabolism and purine metabolic pathways. The genera <italic>Brevundimonas</italic> and <italic>Lactobacillus</italic> were negatively correlated with various compounds involved in purine metabolism, phenylalanine metabolism and sphingolipid signaling pathways.</p></sec><sec id="sec4"><title>Discussion</title><p>We suggest that purine metabolism and phenylalanine metabolism pathway disorders may play a certain role in the pathogenic mechanism of <italic>Staphylococcus aureus</italic> in AD. We also found that females are more likely to be colonized by the genus <italic>Staphylococcus</italic> than males. Differentially abundant metabolites involved in purine metabolism and phenylalanine metabolism pathways were more obvious in female. However, we should notice that the metabolites we detected do not necessarily derived from microbes, they may also origin from the host.</p></sec>