Figure 5.

DR reduced the opportunistic pathogens in the gut microbiota of mice after 5-FU treatment.

Young mice (2-month-old) and old mice (20–24-month-old) were exposed to AL diet or DR for 14 days before intraperitoneal 5-FU injection which was daily performed for 5 days (day -4–day 0), and the diet regimen was continued afterward. Fecal samples were randomly collected from mice on day 4 after 5-FU injection for 16S rRNA gene sequencing (n = 6 mice per group randomly picked from 2 independent experiments) and qPCR analysis (n = 5 mice per group randomly picked from 2 independent experiments).

(A,E) Variation of intestinal microbiota structure of indicated groups along PC1 and PC2 of PCoA based on the Bray – Curtis distance.

(B,F) Relative abundance of the intestinal microbiota of indicated groups on the order level showed by 16S rRNA gene sequencing.

(C,J) Relative abundance of the Betaproteobacterales and Enterobacteriales showed by 16S rRNA gene sequencing.

(D,H) qPCR analysis of the amounts of Proteus of indicated groups.

(C,D) One-way ANOVA test;(G,H) Unpaired two-tailed,Student’s t test; Results were displayed as mean±SD; ns, not significant; * p < .05; **p < 01. Mice which met Death or Moribundity Criteria according to Guidelines for Endpoints in Animal Study Proposals after 5-FU were defined as non-survived or dead. Mice which did not met Death or Moribundity Criteria were defined as survived. DYAL: dead young ad libitum; SYAL: survived young ad libitum.