Abstract
Scalp pruritus is a common skin problem that remains therapeutic challenge. The relationships between the dysbiosis of microbiota and skin diseases have caught attention recently. However, there are few reports about microbiota on itchy scalp. This study investigated scalp microbial characteristics of subjects with mild scalp pruritus of undetermined origin and preliminarily screened physiological factors and bacteria potentially related to pruritus. The pruritus severity of 17 qualified females was evaluated by Visual Analogue Scale (VAS). Microbiota collection was done at both itchy (n = 20) and non-itchy sites (n = 27) at occiput and crown of the same subject and Illumina sequencing was performed at the V3–V4 hypervariable regions of 16S rRNA. The corresponding sebum content, hydration, pH, trans-epidermal water loss, erythema index and porphyrin numbers were also measured by skin tester. We identified 3044 amplicon sequence variants from 821 genera. The itchy and non-itchy sites had different microbiota structures (p = 0.045, by multivariate analysis of variance), while there were large inter- and intra-individual variations. Both sites had Staphylococcus, Cutibacterium and Lawsonella as predominant genera, which were not significantly related to pruritus. The use of three genera Lactobacillus, Morganella and Pseudomonas, could well distinguish non-itchy from itchy groups, whereas different composition patterns existed inside each group. Our investigation indicated that though the bacterial community structure on itchy scalp was individual specific, there was difference between itchy and non-itchy sites. The study provides new insights into microbiota profiling on itchy scalp, which will help microbiota-targeted therapeutic experiment or products design for scalp pruritus.
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Acknowledgements
We are sincerely grateful to all those who participated in this study. This research is academically supported by Henkel (China) Investment Co., Ltd.
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This research was supported by Henkel (China) Investment Co., Ltd.
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LXJ performed bioinformatics, and statistical analyses, and wrote the manuscript. YF, YHS and SY performed sample collection. YF and YHS performed lab work including DNA extraction. CXW and WMM conceived the clinical design and supervised the clinical fieldwork. ZY and ZMH conceived and supervised the study, and provided input on the analyses and writing of the manuscript. All authors contributed to the revision of the manuscript and approved the final version of the manuscript.
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The study was approved by the Scientific and Ethical Committee at the Shanghai Jiao Tong University with No. M19003. All experiments were performed in accordance with the approved guidelines and regulations. All the volunteers signed the informed consent, which explained the procedure and purpose of the study.
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Li, X., Yang, F., Yan, H. et al. Microbiota profiling on itchy scalp with undetermined origin. Arch Microbiol 204, 446 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00203-022-03077-4
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00203-022-03077-4