The Intratumor Microbiota Signatures Associate With Subtype, Tumor Stage, and Survival Status of Esophageal Carcinoma

Overview

Journal Front Oncol

Specialty Oncology

Date 2021 Nov 15

PMID 34778069

Citations 23

Authors

Yangyang Wang

Hua Guo

Xiaoguang Gao

Jihan Wang

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

Altered human microbiome characteristic has been linked with esophageal carcinoma (ESCA), analysis of microbial profiling directly derived from ESCA tumor tissue is beneficial for studying the microbial functions in tumorigenesis and development of ESCA. In this study, we identified the intratumor microbiome signature and investigated the correlation between microbes and clinical characteristics of patients with ESCA, on the basis of data and information obtained from The Cancer Microbiome Atlas (TCMA) and The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) databases. A total of 82 samples were analyzed for microbial composition at various taxonomic levels, including 40 tumor samples of esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC), 20 tumor samples of esophageal adenocarcinoma (EAD), and 22 adjacent normal samples. The results showed that the relative abundance of several microbes changed in tumors compared to their paired normal tissues, such as increased significantly while decreased in tumor samples. We also identified a microbial signature composed of ten microbes that may help in the classification of ESCC and EAD, the two subtypes of ESCA. Correlation analysis demonstrated that compositions of microbes //, //, /, , and were correlated with the clinical characteristics of ESCA patients. In summary, this study supports the feasibility of detecting intratumor microbial composition derived from tumor sequencing data, and it provides novel insights into the roles of microbiota in tumors. Ultimately, as the second genome of human body, microbiome signature analysis may help to add more information to the blueprint of human biology.

Citing Articles

The impact of abandoned iron ore on the endophytic bacterial communities and functions in the root systems of three major crops in the local area.

Chen S, Tang J, Xu J, Peng L, Wu P, Li Q Front Microbiol. 2025; 16:1536083.

PMID: 39906756 PMC: 11790582. DOI: 10.3389/fmicb.2025.1536083.

Effects of vaginal microbiota on fertilization outcomes in women with different infertility causes.

Zhao H, Wang C, Rao M, Rafiq M, Luo G, Li S Microbiol Spectr. 2025; 13(3):e0125524.

PMID: 39868783 PMC: 11878048. DOI: 10.1128/spectrum.01255-24.

Effects of Chenpi ( cv. ) on serum antioxidant enzymes, inflammatory factors, and intestinal health in Beagle dogs.

Wang W, Xu L, Zhang Y, Cao Y, Yang Y, Liu G Front Microbiol. 2025; 15():1415860.

PMID: 39839098 PMC: 11747223. DOI: 10.3389/fmicb.2024.1415860.

Immigration reduces selection in water microbial community assembly.

Zhang F, Wu K, Zhang S, Liang F, Du Z, Wang Y Front Microbiol. 2025; 15():1508136.

PMID: 39839097 PMC: 11747843. DOI: 10.3389/fmicb.2024.1508136.

Intratumor microbiota and colorectal cancer: Comprehensive and lucid review.

Zong Z, Zeng W, Li Y, Wang M, Cao Y, Cheng X Chin J Cancer Res. 2025; 36(6):683-699.

PMID: 39802896 PMC: 11724182. DOI: 10.21147/j.issn.1000-9604.2024.06.07.

References

Uriarte-Navarrete I, Hernandez-Lemus E, Anda-Jauregui G . Gene-Microbiome Co-expression Networks in Colon Cancer. Front Genet. 2021; 12:617505. PMC: 7917223. DOI: 10.3389/fgene.2021.617505. View

Wang J, Wang Y, Li Z, Gao X, Huang D . Global Analysis of Microbiota Signatures in Four Major Types of Gastrointestinal Cancer. Front Oncol. 2021; 11:685641. PMC: 8375155. DOI: 10.3389/fonc.2021.685641. View

Zhao Q, Yang T, Yan Y, Zhang Y, Li Z, Wang Y . Alterations of Oral Microbiota in Chinese Patients With Esophageal Cancer. Front Cell Infect Microbiol. 2020; 10:541144. PMC: 7609410. DOI: 10.3389/fcimb.2020.541144. View

Corning B, Copland A, Frye J . The Esophageal Microbiome in Health and Disease. Curr Gastroenterol Rep. 2018; 20(8):39. DOI: 10.1007/s11894-018-0642-9. View

Abnet C, Arnold M, Wei W . Epidemiology of Esophageal Squamous Cell Carcinoma. Gastroenterology. 2017; 154(2):360-373. PMC: 5836473. DOI: 10.1053/j.gastro.2017.08.023. View

Parida S, Sharma D . The Microbiome-Estrogen Connection and Breast Cancer Risk. Cells. 2019; 8(12). PMC: 6952974. DOI: 10.3390/cells8121642. View

Rodriguez R, Hernandez B, Menor M, Deng Y, Khadka V . The landscape of bacterial presence in tumor and adjacent normal tissue across 9 major cancer types using TCGA exome sequencing. Comput Struct Biotechnol J. 2020; 18:631-641. PMC: 7109368. DOI: 10.1016/j.csbj.2020.03.003. View

Picardo S, Coburn B, Hansen A . The microbiome and cancer for clinicians. Crit Rev Oncol Hematol. 2019; 141:1-12. DOI: 10.1016/j.critrevonc.2019.06.004. View

Ogami C, Tsuji Y, Seki H, Kawano H, To H, Matsumoto Y . An artificial neural network-pharmacokinetic model and its interpretation using Shapley additive explanations. CPT Pharmacometrics Syst Pharmacol. 2021; 10(7):760-768. PMC: 8302242. DOI: 10.1002/psp4.12643. View

10.

Dienstmann R, Vermeulen L, Guinney J, Kopetz S, Tejpar S, Tabernero J . Consensus molecular subtypes and the evolution of precision medicine in colorectal cancer. Nat Rev Cancer. 2017; 17(2):79-92. DOI: 10.1038/nrc.2016.126. View

11.

Parhi L, Alon-Maimon T, Sol A, Nejman D, Shhadeh A, Fainsod-Levi T . Breast cancer colonization by Fusobacterium nucleatum accelerates tumor growth and metastatic progression. Nat Commun. 2020; 11(1):3259. PMC: 7320135. DOI: 10.1038/s41467-020-16967-2. View

12.

Yamamura K, Baba Y, Nakagawa S, Mima K, Miyake K, Nakamura K . Human Microbiome Fusobacterium Nucleatum in Esophageal Cancer Tissue Is Associated with Prognosis. Clin Cancer Res. 2016; 22(22):5574-5581. DOI: 10.1158/1078-0432.CCR-16-1786. View

13.

Chen L, Li Z, Zeng T, Zhang Y, Liu D, Li H . Identifying Robust Microbiota Signatures and Interpretable Rules to Distinguish Cancer Subtypes. Front Mol Biosci. 2020; 7:604794. PMC: 7672214. DOI: 10.3389/fmolb.2020.604794. View

14.

Chakladar J, Kuo S, Castaneda G, Li W, Gnanasekar A, Yu M . The Pancreatic Microbiome is Associated with Carcinogenesis and Worse Prognosis in Males and Smokers. Cancers (Basel). 2020; 12(9). PMC: 7565819. DOI: 10.3390/cancers12092672. View

15.

Grice E, Segre J . The human microbiome: our second genome. Annu Rev Genomics Hum Genet. 2012; 13:151-70. PMC: 3518434. DOI: 10.1146/annurev-genom-090711-163814. View

16.

Linehan W, Ricketts C . The Cancer Genome Atlas of renal cell carcinoma: findings and clinical implications. Nat Rev Urol. 2019; 16(9):539-552. DOI: 10.1038/s41585-019-0211-5. View

17.

Helmink B, Khan M, Hermann A, Gopalakrishnan V, Wargo J . The microbiome, cancer, and cancer therapy. Nat Med. 2019; 25(3):377-388. DOI: 10.1038/s41591-019-0377-7. View

18.

Liu H, Pan L, Lv S, Yang Q, Zhang H, Chen W . Alterations of Gut Microbiota and Blood Lipidome in Gestational Diabetes Mellitus With Hyperlipidemia. Front Physiol. 2019; 10:1015. PMC: 6691352. DOI: 10.3389/fphys.2019.01015. View

19.

. Comprehensive molecular portraits of human breast tumours. Nature. 2012; 490(7418):61-70. PMC: 3465532. DOI: 10.1038/nature11412. View

20.

Lv J, Guo L, Liu J, Zhao H, Zhang J, Wang J . Alteration of the esophageal microbiota in Barrett's esophagus and esophageal adenocarcinoma. World J Gastroenterol. 2019; 25(18):2149-2161. PMC: 6526156. DOI: 10.3748/wjg.v25.i18.2149. View