Objective: The goal of this study was to determine whether the microbiome from Parkinson’s disease (PD) has alterations in a) Polyamine metabolism and b) Expressed taxa of intestinal bacterial.

Background: PD is a neurodegenerative disease characterized by toxic aggregates of α-synuclein (α-syn) affecting primarily dopaminergic neurons in the substantia nigra. Emergent data supports the hypothesis that α-syn aggregates can spread from the gastrointestinal tract via the vagus nerve to the brain. Since many patients with PD manifest gastrointestinal issues years before the onset of motor symptoms, it is essential to study the potential role that the microbiome might play in PD pathology. Polyamines, which are polycations with multiple cellular functions, are known to promote α-syn aggregation.

Method: Polyamine quantification: Samples (feces) were diluted 10-fold with phosphate-buffered saline and sodium azide; supernatant was filtered and used as the fecal extract. This extract was analyzed by Miscellar electrokinetic chromatograpy with laser induced fluorescence detection (Betancourt et al., 2018). 
Whole genome shotgun sequencing method was applied for taxonomic and functional analysis.

Results: Putrescine and spermine concentration were higher in the PD samples than in the normal control (p< 0.01). 
Samples from the PD cohort showed a significant enrichment (Welch’s t-test, p < 0.05) of taxa for Akkermansia muciniphila, Porphyromonas bennonis, Ruminococcus bromii, Methanobrevibacter smithii, and Bifidobacterium adolescentis as compared to the Healthy cohort. Results also showed enrichment for metabolic pathways involving anaerobic oxidative degradation of L-Ornithine (p< 0.015) which is correlated with polyamine metabolism, energy-conserving hydrogenase (p< 0.020) and leucine degradation (p< 0.027)

Conclusion: Microbiome from Parkinson’s patients shows an increase in the levels of the polyamines putrescine and spermine as well as an increased for anaerobic oxidative degradation of L-Ornithine. The results shows that the increased levels of polyamines observed in the microbiome samples of PD patients might be due to an increased activity in the synthesis of polyamines.

References: Micellar electrokinetic chromatography with laser induced fluorescence detection shows increase of putrescine in erythrocytes of Parkinson’s disease patients. Betancourt L., et al., Journal of Chromatography B. V1081–1082, 2018 (https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jchromb.2018.02.015)

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MDS Abstracts - https://www.mdsabstracts.org/abstract/microbiome-from-parkinsons-patients-shows-an-increase-in-polyamines-metabolism-and-differentially-expresses-microbial-bacterial-taxa-compared-to-aged-matched-normal-controls/