Characterizations of gut bacteriome, mycobiome, and virome of healthy individuals living in sea-level and high-altitude areas.

Abstract

The contribution of gut microbiota to human high-altitude adaptation remains inadequatelyunderstood. Here a comparative analysis of gut microbiota was conducted between healthy individuals living at sealevel and high altitude using deep whole-metagenome shotgun sequencing, to investigate the adaptivemechanisms of gut microbiota in plateau inhabitants. The results showed the gut bacteriomes in high-altitude individuals exhibited greater within-samplediversity and significant alterations in both bacterial compositional and functional profiles when compared to thoseof sea-level individuals, indicating the potential selection of unique bacteria associated with high-altitudeenvironments. The strain-level investigation revealed enrichment of Collinsella aerofaciens and Akkermansiamuciniphila in high-altitude populations. The characteristics of gut virome and gut mycobiome were alsoinvestigated. Compared to sea-level subjects, high-altitude subjects exhibited a greater diversity in their gut virome,with an increased number of viral operational taxonomic units (vOTUs) and unique annotated genes. Finally,correlation analyses revealed 819 significant correlations between 42 bacterial species and 375 vOTUs, while nosignificant correlations were observed between bacteria and fungi or between fungi and viruses. The findings have significantly contributed to an enhanced comprehension of the mechanismsunderlying the high-altitude geographic adaptation of the human gut microbiota.