Abstract
The role of metabolomics in autoimmune diseases has been a rapidly expanding area in researches over the last decade, while its pathophysiologic impact on systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) remains poorly elucidated. In this study, we analyzed the metabolic profiling of fecal samples from SLE patients and healthy controls based on ultra-high-performance liquid chromatography equipped with mass spectrometry for exploring the potential biomarkers of SLE. The results showed that 23 differential metabolites and 5 perturbed pathways were identified between the two groups, including aminoacyl-tRNA biosynthesis, thiamine metabolism, nitrogen metabolism, tryptophan metabolism, and cyanoamino acid metabolism. In addition, logistic regression and ROC analysis were used to establish a diagnostic model for distinguishing SLE patients from healthy controls. The combined model of fecal PG 27:2 and proline achieved an area under the ROC curve of 0.846, and had a good diagnostic efficacy. In the present study, we analyzed the correlations between fecal metabolic perturbations and SLE pathogenesis. In summary, we firstly illustrate the comprehensive metabolic profiles of feces in SLE patients, suggesting that the fecal metabolites could be used as the potential non-invasive biomarkers for SLE.
Highlights
Systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) is an autoimmune disease with persistent inflammation that affects multiple organ systems, characterized by high morbidity and low quality of life
A total of 23 most significant metabolites that were involved in the amino acids, lipids, purine, and vitamin metabolisms were altered in feces of systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) group, compared with healthy controls (HC) group (Table 2)
Aminoacyl-tRNA biosynthesis, thiamine metabolism, nitrogen metabolism, tryptophan metabolism, and cyanoamino acid metabolism were perturbed in SLE compared to healthy controls
Summary
Systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) is an autoimmune disease with persistent inflammation that affects multiple organ systems, characterized by high morbidity and low quality of life. A lot of evidences suggest that the gut microbiome takes an important role in inflammatory and autoimmune diseases by affecting the immune system and metabolic pathways [2, 3]. The researches on the gut microbiota compositions have exhibited lower Firmicutes, higher Bacteroidetes and lower Firmicutes/Bacteroidetes (F/B) ratio in SLE patients compared to healthy controls [4, 5]. Further study have reported that the F/B ratio was strongly associated with serum free fatty acids (FFA) levels and the fecal short chain fatty acids levels (SCFA) paralleled those of serum FFA in healthy controls, whereas these associations were not found in lupus patients [6]
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