Effect of Copper Deficient Diet on Gut Microbiota in Mice

Copper is an essencial metal for animals to maintain fat metabolism and other important reactions.In order to study the effect of copper deficient diets on composition of intestinal microbiota and their metabolic pathways, 20 health C57BL/6 adult mice with similar body weight were chosen and fed chow diet for 7 d,and then divided into 2 groups.The mice in control group fed with copper deficient diet and 25 mg/L copper water while the experimental group mice were fed copper deficient diet and copper free water for one month.At the end of the test,the blood samples were collected to determine the ceruloplasmin content,and the caecum content were used to analyze the 16S rRNA genome by high throughput sequencing. The results showed that compared with control group,the ceruloplasmin content in experimental group was extremely significantly decreased (P < 0.001).And there were 5 siginificant differences microorganism in phylum level and 43 in genus level (P<0.05). There were 19 significant different pathways in the second grade of KEGG (P<0.05),in which metabolic-related functions were lipid metabolism, glycine biosynthesis and metabolism,metabolism of terpenoids and polyketides,biosynthesis of other secondary metabolisms and amino acid metabolism,indicating that the absence of copper in diets could alter the structure of some microbial flora and the changes of the relevant functions. It provided an important idea for studying the function of copper in the structure and metabolism of intestinal colonies in mice.