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Volume 6, Issue 7(Suppl) J Gastrointest Dig Syst 2016
ISSN: 2161-069X JGDS, an open access journal
Page 45
Notes:
Gastro Congress 2016
October 24-25, 2016
conferenceseries.com
October 24-25, 2016 Valencia, Spain
9th Euro Global
Gastroenterology Conference
Obesity and microbiota among healthy Saudis with various degrees of obesity
Steve Harakeh1, Suhad Bahijri1 , Ghada Ajabnoor1, Ahmed Al-Hejin 2, Michael W Pfaffl3, Suha Farraj1, Gehan Hegazy1, Saad Masaudi2, Salah Barnawi1,
Abdalla Ahmed4, Sulaiman Alfadul 5 and EsamIbraheem Azhar1
1King Fahd Medical Research Center - King Abdulaziz University, Saudi Arabia
2King Abdulaziz University, Saudi Arabia
3Technical University Munich, Germany
4Umm Al-Qura University, Saudi Arabia
5King Abdulaziz City for Science and Technology, Saudi Arabia
Background: Obesity is a modern global epidemic and is a risk factor for diabetes and cardiovascular diseases (CVD). The
prevalence of overweight and obesity in Saudi Arabia is on the rise, placing a huge burden on health and economic resources.
Recently, gut microbiota has been reported to be involved in the pathogenesis of many metabolic disorders and diseases,
including obesity, diabetes, and CVD.
Objective: The objective of this study was to identify obesity-associated gut microbiota dysbiosis and their relationship to body
mass index (BMI) among healthy Saudis with different degrees of obesity.
Methodology: A total of 56 healthy individuals with different degrees of obesity were recruited. All those filled out a
questionnaire related to their nutritional habits, health conditions and demographics. Their height, body weight, hip and
waist circumference were measured (BMI and age). Stool samples were collected and genomic DNA was extracted from those
samples. The DNA samples were sequenced via next generation sequencing (MiSeq), sequencing reads were quality trimmed,
analyzed and assigned to taxonomic units using 16S Meta genomics app (Illumina Base Space). One way ANOVA was used to
find whether there is a significant between BMI in relation to microbial species
Results: The results indicated the presence of various bacteriological species. Porphyromonas circumdentaria,
Fervidobacterium islandicum and Desulforhopalus singaporensis were found in the underweight group, while Lysobacter
soli, Anoxybacillus eryuanensis and Anoxybacillus flavithermus were present in the obese group.
Conclusion/Recommendations: The results indicated that 1538 species were detected. There is some difference among the
different species in relation to BMI. Work is in progress to include more human subjects and find the bacteria involved with
obesity.
Biography
Steve Harakeh received his BSc and MSc from the American University of Beirut (AUB). He was awarded his PhD degree in Microbiology from the University of
Surrey, UK. He spent two years as a Postdoctoral Research Fellow in the Microbiology and Immunology Department, School of Medicine at Stanford University,
USA, and then he was appointed as a Research Associate (Research Assistant Professor) in the same department. He joined the Linus Pauling Institute for Science
and Medicine where he worked and published with Professor Pauling who is the only holder of two unshared Noble prizes in the world. After that he was appointed
as a Professor of Microbiology at the AUB. Then he worked as a Research Professor at Dr. Rath Research Institute in California, USA. Currently, he is a Professor
at the Special Infectious Agents Unit – Biosafety Level 3 (SIAU). He is the Vice Chairman of the KFMRC Quality Control and Biosafety Committee, member of
infectious disease research group. He has recently been appointed as a member of “Yousef Abdullatif Jameel Research Chair for Prophetic Medicine” and is
already engaged with them in several ongoing research projects. He is the recipient of several awards and research grants and published over seventy papers in
peer reviewed journals and contributed to publishing chapters in many international scientific books.
Steve Harakeh et al., J Gastrointest Dig Syst 2016, 6:7(Suppl)