16S rRNA based microbial community survey of oral and gut samples of healthy and colorectal cancer patients from Iran

Colorectal cancer (CRC) is the third most common cancer type worldwide. Increasingly, the gastrointestinal microbiome has been identified as an important factor in the pathogenesis of CRC. In this work, for the first time in Iran, an analysis of the whole microbiome in saliva and stool samples of CRC patients has been conducted, and the results were investigated and compared with healthy controls (HCs). In the present study, we found that there is a distinct clustering of genera associated with the saliva and fecal samples of CRC patients and HCs, respectively, pointing to special microbial signatures in both conditions. However, the roles of microbiota in CRC and HCs require further investigation.