Figure 1.
Abundance of Fusobacterium in rectal mucosal biopsies from adenoma cases and non-adenoma controls.
qPCR results show that Fusobacterium is more abundant in cases than controls.
Table 1.
Characteristics of Study Participants.
Table 2.
Association between Fusobacterium abundance and colorectal adenomas.
Figure 2.
Representative fluorescence in situ hybridization targeting Fusobacterium sp. in colorectal mucosal biopsy sections using bacterial 16S rRNA probes.
Fig. 2A–B are composite images of Cy3 and DAPI views of sections hybridized with a Fusobacterium-specific probe. Fusobacterium species is localized within the mucus layer of colorectal sections (A) 20X and 40X. Fusobacterium species is localized within the crypts of colorectal section (B) 20X and 40X. Fig. 2C (20X and 40X) is a positive control and shows sections stained with general bacteria probe (Eub 388). General bacteria, including most Eubacteria species, are localized to the mucus layer above the epithelium. White arrows point to bacteria either in mucus layer above the colonic epithelium or within the crypt.
Figure 3.
Correlations between Fusobacterium abundance and local cytokine gene expression in adenoma cases and non-adenoma controls.
Results suggest a significant positive correlation between Fusobacterium abundance and local inflammation in cases but not controls. The Correlations were significant for IL-10 (r = 0.44, p = 0.01) and TNF-α (r = 0.33, p = 0.06). *p<0.05.
Figure 4.
Log Abundance of Fusobacterium in matched normal colon and colorectal cancer tissue.
Fusobacterium abundance was evaluated in DNA samples from normal colon and tumor tissue by qPCR using Fusobacterium-specific primers. Results suggest that Fusobacterium is increased in colon cancer tissue compared to normal tissue (t-test p = 0.0005).
Table 3.
Relationship between Fusobacterium and colorectal tumor characteristics.