High-throughput amplicon sequencing reveals potential impact of kidney graft, transplantation period and lifestyle diseases on gut microbiota.

Gaining long-term graft function and patient life quality remain critical challenges following kidney transplantation. Advances in immunology, gnotobiotic, and culture-independent molecular techniques have provided growing insights into the complex relationship between the microbiome and the host. However, little is known about the overtime shift of the gut microbiota in the context of kidney transplant and its impact on both graft and health stability. Here we aimed to characterize the structure of gut microbiota within stable kidney graft recipients. We enrolled forty kidney transplant patients after at least three months of transplantation and compared them to eighteen healthy controls. We characterized bacterial composition by polymerase chain reaction amplification of the 16S rRNA V3-V4 variable region and deep sequencing using the Illumina MiSeq platform. The overall microbial structure of kidney transplanted group was clearly different from control subjects.