Title

Data mining analysis of human gut microbiota links Fusobacterium spp. with colorectal cancer onset

Authors

Najla Kharrat^1*, Mourad Assidi^2,3, Muhammad Abu-Elmagd^2,3,4, Peter N. Pushparaj^2,3, AreejAlkhaldy⁵, Leila Arfaoui⁵, Muhammad Imran Naseer^2,3, Abdelfatteh El Omri⁶, Safia Messaoudi⁷, Abdelbaset Buhmeida^2,3, Ahmed Rebai¹

Affiliation

¹Laboratory of Molecular and Cellular Screening Processes, Centre of Biotechnologyof Sfax, Bioinformatics Group, P.O. Box: 1177, Sfax, 3018 Tunisia; ²Center of Excellence in Genomic Medicine Research, King Abdulaziz University, Jeddah, Saudi Arabia; ³Medical Technology Department, Faculty of Applied Medical Sciences, King Abdulaziz University, Jeddah, Saudi Arabia; ⁴School of Biological Sciences, University of East Anglia, Norwich, NR4 7TJ, UK; ⁵Clinical Nutrition Department, Faculty of Applied Medical Sciences, King Abdulaziz University, Jeddah, Saudi Arabia; ⁶Department of Biological Sciences, Faculty of Science, King Abdulaziz University, Jeddah, Saudi Arabia; ⁷Forensic Biology Department, College of Forensic Sciences, Naïf Arab University for Security Sciences, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia

Email

Dr. Najla Kharrat – Phone: +216 74 871 816; E-mail - najla.kharrat@cbs.rnrt.tn; *Corresponding author

Article Type

Research Article

Date

Received May 7, 2019; Accepted May 9, 2019; Published May 30, 2019

Gut microbiota and their metabolites play a vital role in colon health and disease. Accumulating evidence suggests that the gut microbiota contributes to the risk of colorectal cancer (CRC). However, the role of a specific microbial community together with their metabolites contributing to the risk, initiation and progression of CRC is still unknown. Hence, we used a Bayesian Networks in combination with the IDA (Intervention calculus when the DAG is absent) to generate a graphical model that allows causal relationships to be inferred from observational data. Results from the analysis of publically available datasets showed that four species: Fusobacteium, Citrobacter, Microbacterium and Slaxkia have estimated non-null lower bounds of causal effects of CRC. These findings support the hypothesis that specific bacterial species (microbial markers) act in concert with locally modified microbiota to cause or influence CRC progression. Additional comprehensive studies are required to validate the potential use of F. nucleatum, Citrobacter as well as Slackia as microbial
biomarkers in CRC for prevention, diagnosis, prognosis and/or therapeutics.

Keywords

Colorectal cancer, microbiome, bacteria, Fusobacterium spp., IDA method, biomarker

Citation

Kharrat et al. Bioinformation 15(6): 372-379 (2019)

Edited by

P Kangueane

ISSN

0973-2063

Publisher

Biomedical Informatics

License

This is an Open Access article which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly credited. This is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License.