RELATIVE ABUNDANCE OF phyla ACTINOBACTERIA AND VITAMIN C CONSUMPTION ARE ASSOCIATED WITH DNA METHYLATION.

Background: Intestinal microbiota is an emerging field and is related to health and disease. There is an emerging body of evidence that Vitamin C consumption can modulate microbiota abundance and can also impact DNA methylation of the host and this could be a link between diet, microbiota, and immune response. Objective: It was to evaluate common CpG sites associated both vitamin C and microbiota phyla abundance. Methods: Six healthy women participated in this cohort study. They were divided into two groups, according to the amount of ingested Vitamin C. Ingestion was evaluated using the 24 h-recall method. Illumina 450k Beadchip was used to evaluate DNA methylation. Singular Value Decomposition analyses were used to evaluate the principal components of this dataset. Associations were evaluated using the Differentially Methylated Positions function from the Champ package for R Studio. The Shapiro-Wilk test was used to verify normality, t-tests were used to verify differences between groups, and Spearman's correlation was done between Vitamin C and phyla.