Faecal and mucosal microbiota in patients with functional gastrointestinal disorders: Correlation with toll-like receptor 2/toll-like receptor 4 expression

Figure 1 16S rRNA gene surveys reveal a clear separation between luminal microbiota and mucosa-associated microbiota. A: Dendrogram obtained from the complete linkage hierarchical clustering of the stool and mucosa samples based on the total operational taxonomic units; B: Principal coordinate analysis plot based on the weighted UniFrac metric.

Figure 2 Relative abundance of bacterial genera in the stool and mucosa samples. Statistically significant differences were observed for all genera (P < 0.05). LM: Luminal microbiota; MAM: Mucosa-associated microbiota.

Figure 3 The expression of toll-like receptor 2 is significantly and positively correlated with toll-like receptor 4 expression (r = 0. 492, P = 0.004). TLR: Toll-like receptor.

Figure 4 Correlogram showing the Pearson’s correlation between key genera and toll-like receptors in both faecal and mucosa samples. Blue circles designate a positive correlation, while red ones designate a negative correlation. X means no significant result according to the significance level of 0.05. TLR: Toll-like receptor; MAM: Mucosa-associated microbiota; LM: Luminal microbiota.