The Molecular Analysis Of The Diversity Of The Seminal And EPS Microbiota Associated With CP/CPPS

Background:Chronic Prostatitis/Chronic plvic pain syndrome (CP/CPPS) is a highly prevalent syndrome characterized by perineal, penile, scrotal, suprapubic, and/or ejaculatory pain in male urological outpatient department. The etiology of CP/CPPS is often unclear. Antibiotic treatments aimed at certain microorganisms are ineffective in a large percentage of CP/CPPS sufferers, suggesting etiologies outside single or several microorganism infection. One possibility is that CP/CPPS is influenced by dysbiosis of microbes that inhabit the male genital tract (male genital microbiota). However, little is known about the overall structure and composition of male genital microbial communities.Methods:In the present study, the diversity and richness of the seminal and expressed prostatic secretions (EPS) microbiota from30healthy men and30CP/CPPS patients from China were investigated using culture-independent PCR-denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis (DGGE) and barcoded454pyrosequencing methods.Results:Our data demonstrated that there was a profound shift in the absolute and relative abundances of bacterial species present in the genital when comparing populations associated with healthy and diseased conditions. In spite of significant interpersonal variations, the diversity of genital microbiota in the two groups could be clearly divided into two clusters. The most predominant phyla of bacteria identified in the genital belonged to Firmicutes, Actinobacteria, Bacteroidetes, Proteobacteria, Fusobacteria, Tenericutes, Cyanobacteria, Chloroflexi, and Acidobacteria. The higher number of phylotypes in CP/CPPS over healthy men is consistent with the results of previous studies and a large number of low-abundance taxa which were missed in previous studies were revealed. Additionally a single bacterium of phylum Verrucomicro could be identified as a specific marker for CP/CPPS over health conditions (p<0.05). More interestingly, the decreased microbial similarity between semen and EPS in individuals was strongly associated with CP/CPPS (p<0.05), which could potentially fair biomarkers and could be used as new therapeutic for clinical CP/CPPS by molecular approaches.Conclusions:The data presented here have firstly characterized the genital communities and clearly demonstrated that CP/CPPS is associated with a dramatic increase in the relative abundance of Verrucomicro bacteria and a significant decrease in the microbial similarity between the semen and expressed prostatic secretions of the same individuals. The study also provides the most comprehensive picture of the genital community structure and the bacterial ecosystem, and significantly contributes to the current understanding of the etiology of CP/CPPS.