Colorectal cancer and the fecal microbiome

Researchers have investigated the links between colorectal cancer and the gut microbiota. They analyzed the fecal microbiome and the genomic and transcriptomic profiles of matched tumor and normal tissues in 41 colorectal cancer patients. The researchers identified a set of 22 gut microbial species associated with colorectal cancer and analyzed their relative abundance. Four genes were found to be impacted by these colorectal cancer-related microbial species. The Fusobacterium nucleatum species was positively correlated with different host metabolic pathways, but could also modify the tumor environment through expression of the TNFSF9 gene.