Alteration of Gut Microbiota in Alzheimer’s Disease and Their Relation to the Cognitive Impairment

Abstract

Background: Dysbiosis of gut microbiota has been reported to be enrolled in the pathogenesis of Alzheimer’s disease (AD). However, there is a lack of relevant studies on this topic in Egyptian patients with AD. Objective: To investigate different species of gut microbiota in Egyptian patients with AD and correlate microbiota bacterial abundance with clinical data. Methods: The study included 25 patients with AD and 25 healthy volunteers as age and sex-matched controls. Clinical data was taken for each patient, including medical history and examination; Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) and Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA) were assessed for each participant. Bacterial DNA was extracted from stool, and abundance quantified via qPCR using 16S rRNA group-specific primers. Results: Akkermansia, Enterobacteria, Bacteroidetes, Bacillus cereus, Prevotella, and Clostridium cluster IV were more abundant in the AD group than in the control group, although there was significantly less abundance of Bifidobacterium spp., Firmicutes, and Actinobacteria in patients with AD than in controls, whereas no such significance was found for lactic acid bacteria between both groups. Lactic acid bacteria and Prevotella abundance was negatively correlated with cognitive impairment (p = 0.03 with MMSE, and p = 0.03 with MoCA). Prevotella abundance was positively correlated with age of onset and duration of illness and negatively correlated with smoking and coronary heart disease (p = 0.007, p = 0.03, p = 0.035, and p = 0.047, respectively). Conclusion: The current work highlighted a significant relationship between AD and gut microbiota dysbiosis. A higher abundance of Prevotella species and lactic acid bacteria was correlated with cognition.