Gut microbiome of elementary school students

Human gut microbial communities establish in the first several years of a human’s life. Studies in rodents and humans have demonstrated that gutmicrobiome changes are often associated with health effects, complex modulation of the central nervous system, and alterations in behavior. A number of studies report that commensal gut microbiota can stimulate complex cognitive functions. Our goal was to advance this research area by exploring the associations between the composition of the gut microbial community of children and their academicperformance. We sequenced the 16S rRNA genes isolated from gut microbiome samples of 104Chinese elementary school students. The academic performance of the students was assessed every six months for the total duration of 2 years. The attentionspan in the class was evaluated with a specifically designed scoring system. After grouping the students by the academic performance and the attention spanscores, we applied non-parametric statistical tests to identify taxa significantly associated with the scores.