Arsenic-Containing Medicine Treatment Disturbed the Human Intestinal Microbial Flora

Human intestinal microbiome plays vital role in maintaining intestinal homeostasis and interacting with xenobiotics. Few investigations have been conducted to understand the effect of arsenic-containing medicine exposure on gut microbiome. Most animal experiments are onerous in terms of time and resources and not in line with the international effort to reduce animal experiments. We explored the overall microbial flora by 16S rRNA genes analysis in fecal samples from acute promyelocytic leukemia (APL) patients treated with arsenic trioxide (ATO) plus all-trans retinoic acid (ATRA). Gut microbiomes were found to be overwhelmingly dominated by Firmicutes and Bacteroidetes after taking medicines containing arsenic in APL patients. The fecal microbiota composition of APL patients after treatment showed lower diversity and uniformity shown by the alpha diversity indices of Chao, Shannon, and Simpson. Gut microbiome operational taxonomic unit (OTU) numbers were associated with arsenic in the feces. We evaluated Bifidobacterium adolescentis and Lactobacillus mucosae to be a keystone in APL patients after treatment. Bacteroides at phylum or genus taxonomic levels were consistently affected after treatment. In the most common gut bacteria Bacteroides fragilis, arsenic resistance genes were significantly induced by arsenic exposure in anaerobic pure culture experiments. Without an animal model, without taking arsenicals passively, the results evidence that arsenic exposure by drug treatment is not only associated with alterations in intestinal microbiome development at the abundance and diversity level, but also induced arsenic biotransformation genes (ABGs) at the function levels which may even extend to arsenic-related health outcomes in APL.