Charting host-microbe co-metabolism in skin aging and application to metagenomics data

PLoS One. 2021 Nov 10;16(11):e0258960. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0258960. eCollection 2021.

Abstract

During aging of human skin, a number of intrinsic and extrinsic factors cause the alteration of the skin's structure, function and cutaneous physiology. Many studies have investigated the influence of the skin microbiome on these alterations, but the molecular mechanisms that dictate the interplay between these factors and the skin microbiome are still not fully understood. To obtain more insight into the connection between the skin microbiome and the human physiological processes involved in skin aging, we performed a systematic study on interconnected pathways of human and bacterial metabolic processes that are known to play a role in skin aging. The bacterial genes in these pathways were subsequently used to create Hidden Markov Models (HMMs), which were applied to screen for presence of defined functionalities in both genomic and metagenomic datasets of skin-associated bacteria. These models were further applied on 16S rRNA gene sequencing data from skin microbiota samples derived from female volunteers of two different age groups (25-28 years ('young') and 59-68 years ('old')). The results show that the main bacterial pathways associated with aging skin are those involved in the production of pigmentation intermediates, fatty acids and ceramides. This study furthermore provides evidence for a relation between skin aging and bacterial enzymes involved in protein glycation. Taken together, the results and insights described in this paper provide new leads for intervening with bacterial processes that are associated with aging of human skin.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Adult
  • Aged
  • Bacteria / genetics
  • Bacteria / metabolism
  • Ceramides / metabolism
  • Fatty Acids / metabolism
  • Female
  • Genes, Bacterial
  • Healthy Volunteers
  • Host Microbial Interactions / genetics
  • Humans
  • Markov Chains
  • Metagenome*
  • Metagenomics / methods*
  • Microbiota / genetics*
  • Middle Aged
  • RNA, Ribosomal, 16S / genetics
  • Signal Transduction / genetics
  • Skin / metabolism
  • Skin / microbiology*
  • Skin Aging / genetics*
  • Skin Pigmentation / genetics

Substances

  • Ceramides
  • Fatty Acids
  • RNA, Ribosomal, 16S

Grants and funding

Estée Lauder Companies is a company selling skin care products, which partly funded this study and provided the samples for this study. The funder provided support in the form of salaries for authors JB, WA, RTE, SL, FdG and GAMK, but did not have any additional role in the study design for data analysis and interpretation, in data collection and analysis and in preparation of the manuscript. The funder supported the decision to publish the study through co-authors KS and SS. The specific roles of these authors are articulated in the ‘author contributions’ section. TenWise B.V. played no role in funding or decision to publish and is merely mentioned as a current address of one of the NIZO-affiliated co-authors (WA). There are no competing interests with TenWise.