Patient cohorts and microbial profiling

IBD includes two diseases, Crohn’s (CD) and Ulcerative colitis (UC). Two studies are planned for each. One will compare patients in remission with healthy relatives (30 for each disease), the other will follow the 30 patients over a 2 year period, during which about  50 % are expected to relapse. The first aims to identify bacterial genes associated with the disease, while the second aims to identify genes associated with relapse. This information could be used to predict risk of disease and of relapse, which would be of great value for diagnosis and preventive treatment. These studies have been approved by the ethical committee of the Val d’Hebron Hospital in Barcelona, Spain, where the patients are followed. Currently the cohorts are of 15 patients and 9 family matched controls for the UC studies, and 8 patients and 9 family matched controls for the CD studies. Microbial DNA from 24 individuals has been analyzed by the high throughput sequencing technology.

Obesity is associated with a number of co-morbidities, such as diabetes, hypertension and cardiovascular disease. These co-morbidities are found typically in individuals with visceral rather than subcutaneous obesity. We plan to compare 60 individuals of each type with 60 healthy individuals, aiming to detect bacterial genes associated with obesity which could be used as risk predictors. The study has been approved by the ethical committee of Copenhagen, where the individuals are being followed at the Novo Nordisk Steno Diabetes Center. The cohort consists of 46 lean individuals and 40 obese individuals at present. Microbial DNA from all of them has been analyzed by the high throughput sequencing technology.