Ma C, Yang J, Fu XN, Luo JY, Liu P, Zeng XL, Li XY, Zhang SL, Zheng S. Microbial characteristics of gut microbiome dysbiosis in patients with chronic liver disease. World J Hepatol 2025; 17(5): 106124 [DOI: 10.4254/wjh.v17.i5.106124]
Corresponding Author of This Article
Sheng Zheng, Associate Professor, Department of Gastroenterology, The Third People’s Hospital of Yunnan Province, No. 292 Beijing Road, Guandu District, Kunming 650011, Yunnan Province, China. zheng_sheng523@163.com
Research Domain of This Article
Gastroenterology & Hepatology
Article-Type of This Article
Basic Study
Open-Access Policy of This Article
This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
World J Hepatol. May 27, 2025; 17(5): 106124 Published online May 27, 2025. doi: 10.4254/wjh.v17.i5.106124
Microbial characteristics of gut microbiome dysbiosis in patients with chronic liver disease
Chi Ma, Juan Yang, Xin-Nian Fu, Jiang-Yan Luo, Pei Liu, Xue-Li Zeng, Xin-Yi Li, Shun-Ling Zhang, Sheng Zheng
Chi Ma, Xin-Nian Fu, Jiang-Yan Luo, Pei Liu, Xue-Li Zeng, Xin-Yi Li, Shun-Ling Zhang, Department of Gastroenterology, The Second Affiliated Hospital of Dali University, Kunming 650011, Yunnan Province, China
Juan Yang, Sheng Zheng, Department of Gastroenterology, The Third People’s Hospital of Yunnan Province, Kunming 650011, Yunnan Province, China
Author contributions: Ma C contributed software, resources, data organization, writing of the original manuscript, and project management to the manuscript; Yang J contributed methodology to the manuscript; Fu XN, Luo JY, and Liu P contributed validation to the manuscript; Yang J and Zheng S performed conceptualization and funding acquisition; Yang J, Fu XN, Luo JY, Liu P, Zeng XL, Li XY, Zhang SL, and Zheng S wrote the manuscript; Zeng XL conducted the formal analysis, review and editing; Li XY and Zhang SL conducted the investigation; Zheng S conducted the visualization, supervision; and all authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.
Supported by the Yunnan Provincial High-Level Science and Technology Talent and Innovation Team Selection Special - Young Academic and Technical Leader Backup Talent Project, No. 202405AC350067; and the Yunnan Provincial Department of Education Scientific Research Fund Project, No. 2024Y919 and No. 2024Y920.
Institutional review board statement: This study was approved by the Medical Ethics Committee of the Third People’s Hospital of Yunnan Province, approval No. 2023KY050.
Conflict-of-interest statement: All the authors report no relevant conflicts of interest for this article.
Data sharing statement: All data generated or analyzed during this study are included in its Supplementary material.
Open Access: This article is an open-access article that was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: https://creativecommons.org/Licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Corresponding author: Sheng Zheng, Associate Professor, Department of Gastroenterology, The Third People’s Hospital of Yunnan Province, No. 292 Beijing Road, Guandu District, Kunming 650011, Yunnan Province, China. zheng_sheng523@163.com
Received: February 17, 2025 Revised: March 28, 2025 Accepted: April 24, 2025 Published online: May 27, 2025 Processing time: 99 Days and 20.3 Hours
Abstract
BACKGROUND
In this study, we are committed to exploring the characteristics of the gut microbiome in three different stages of chronic liver disease (CLD): Chronic hepatitis B, liver cirrhosis, and hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC).
AIM
To delineate the gut microbiota traits in individuals with chronic liver ailments (chronic hepatitis B, cirrhosis, HCC), scrutinizes microbiome alterations during the progression of these diseases, and assesses microbiome disparities among various Child-Pugh categories in cirrhosis sufferers.
METHODS
A cohort of 60 CLD patients from the Third People’s Hospital of Yunnan Province were recruited from February to August 2023, together with 37 healthy counterparts. Employing 16SrDNA high-throughput sequencing, we evaluated the diversity and composition of the gut microbiota.
RESULTS
Compared to healthy subjects, patients exhibited a reduced presence of Firmicutes and a corresponding decline in butyrate-producing genera. In contrast, an upsurge in Proteobacteria was observed in the diseased cohorts, particularly an increase in Enterobacteriaceae that intensified with the disease's progression. At the genus level, the occurrence of Escherichia_Shigella, Parabacteroides, Streptococcus, Klebsiella, and Enterococcus was higher, with Escherichia_Shigella numbers augmenting as the disease advanced. Furthermore, in cirrhosis patients, an increase in Proteobacteria was noted as liver reserve diminished, alongside a decrease in Ruminococcaceae and Bacteroidaceae.
CONCLUSION
The reduced abundance of short-chain fatty acid-producing bacteria in the intestine, alongside the increased abundance of gram-negative bacteria such as Escherichia_Shigella and Parabacteroides, may promote the progression of CLD.
Core Tip: The study emphasized the microbial characteristics of gut microbiome dysbiosis at different stages of chronic liver disease (CLD). In this study, 16SrDNA sequencing was used to detect the gut microbiome characteristics in the CLD population. The reduced abundance of short-chain fatty acid-producing bacteria in the intestine, alongside the increased abundance of gram-negative bacteria such as Escherichia_Shigella and Parabacteroides, may promote the progression of CLD by compromising the integrity of the intestinal mucosal barrier. The results of this study may provide new insights for developing novel diagnostic and therapeutic strategies for CLD.
