The Core and Distinction of the Gut Microbiota in Chinese Populations across Geography and Ethnicity

The diversity of the human gut microbiota constitutes a fundamental health indicator of different populations. The relative importance of geographical location and ethnicity on the gut microbiota, however, has not been previously addressed. Due to unique ethnic distributions across China, we recruited distinct minority ethnic groups, including Han populations, in each of the seven cities that were explored in this study. We investigated the gut microbiota of 394 healthy subjects (14 groups) from these seven different cities using 16S rRNA sequencing. Our results indicated that both geographical location and ethnicity were major factors. However, geographical location exhibited greater influence than ethnicity on both the composition and diversity of the gut microbiota. In addition, a total of 15 shared biomarkers at the genus level were identified in three distinct locations, including seven in Inner Mongolia, seven in Xinjiang and one in Gansu. Furthermore, 65 unique biomarkers were found in 14 population groups, which indicated specific communities in different populations. Based on the gut microbiota species, two main enterotypes—namely Prevotella (ETP) and Bacteroides (ETB), which consist of Prevotella and Bacteroides as the core bacterial genus, were observed in Chinese populations. Our unique experimental design using the same ethnic group—Han, as a control in different locations, enables delineating the importance of geographical location and ethnicity on the gut microbiota, and provides the fundamental characteristics of gut microbiota diversity in Chinese populations.