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Community project - gut flora sequencing

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Ulcerative Colitis
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Posted 10/24/2014 11:20 AM (GMT -5)
I was wondering if folks here are interested in a community project of gut flora sequencing with uBiome. We all can get kits from uBiome to sequence the gut flora and then share the results, to see how the gut flora is different depending on the meds and supplements you take, and any other interventions you may be doing.

We can ask for a special pricing from uBiome.

Any comments?
Posted 10/24/2014 11:42 AM (GMT -5)
if this would include a potluck and beer tent, i'm in baby !


would be interesting, even w/o the eats and drinks -

any idea of the cash involved df ?
Posted 10/24/2014 11:49 AM (GMT -5)
That sounds interesting. I just looked up uBiome. I hadn't heard of it before. Definitely interested.
Posted 10/24/2014 11:57 AM (GMT -5)
I have always thought testing a spouse or relative that has lived with you a long time and comparing them to you would be interesting. Might shed light on whether a altered biome is a result or a cause of UC. Sure wish the company would do a free or reduced cost testing IBD people like 23andme did with genetic testing then compile the results.It might be really cool to combine genetic and biome results with surveys of IBD patients. Find genetic and environment risk factors on a large population.

Have you signed up for the free 23andme test yet?

If the price was a bit lower I would like to test myself and my spouse for gut bacteria.
Posted 10/24/2014 12:26 PM (GMT -5)
I did the 23andme test. So nice they were offering it for free!

23andme really only provides ancestry information. Then you get raw genetic data. I paid an extra $10 (I think) and some other service took the 23andme data and turned into into a health report. Went through the genes and said what each one was for disease wise, etc. It was interesting. I, not surprisingly, have some weird mutations for auto-immune diseases, arthritis, and IBD. Interesting, but didn't really help me too much. I more hope that by contributing I've helped the greater good in the long term.
Posted 10/24/2014 12:51 PM (GMT -5)
I did the outside test with promthese(?)/ I think it was $5. A neat health thing you can still do on 23andme is the Browse Raw Data. This lets you check the SNPs(mutations, written as R#####) and genotypes you have. There is a expandable listing of links to information on that mutation. Often articles list the R###### and SNPedia lists SNPs for various medical conditions and drug reactions. You can then find out if you have that genetic positive or negative. I found outI am at very high risk for skin cancer and macular degeneration. You can do something about both.

Main reason to do it is very little is known about genetic risk factors for UC. Much less than even Crohns. The data could shed light on meds that might work or not work to tailor a treatment flow chart. Diet issues do show up to some extent and could help you avoid problem foods.
Posted 10/24/2014 1:00 PM (GMT -5)
I sent our uBiome samples 3 weeks ago, expecting results in another 3 weeks. I paid $79/kit because I asked them for a discount code, as I plan to sequence gut flora every 3 months.

DS has autism and there is a significant gut connection in autism. Although he is rather high functioning, his communication skills or language is not at par with his peers, and I want to know if gut is involved in any of his symptoms, plus how his gut flora is close to mine. The odds of getting him UC are rather high for, me with UC and over represented gut issues in autism.

For me, I would like to see how my gut flora changes from flare to remission induced and remission maintained.

Regarding 23andMe, I had already used their service so I didn't qualify for this new IBD study, as I am already their client. It still baffles me a bit, but its their call.

Soy,
Would love to have such beer and food meet but I gave up all of it about 6 years ago.

Colitisgirl,
We get it free but they probably sell anonymized data to pharma giants. I read recently they are collaborating with Pfizer on some projects. Wouldn't surprise me at all if they come up with a new drug in 8 to 10 years time.


Regarding costs, depending on how many of us are interested, we can bargain with them for the cost/kit. If they give me $10 discount/kit for using just 12 kits then I am pretty sure we can bargain hard for 50 or so kits, depending on how many of us sign up and number of kits everyone is willing to buy.

Thereafter, some techie/coding person(s) should help us with the data.
Posted 10/24/2014 1:01 PM (GMT -5)
I had uBiome when it first cam out. I also did the 23andMe when it was free for IBD.

I learned some things, like I had some gene variants that have been associated with IBD. (But, I suspected that already.)

Someone could get some information about a food sensitivity or about whether they have a few or tey have lots of the genes associated with IBD - but it will not tell you about you environmental triggers, not will it give you information on you gene expression and epigenetics (which may count more).

I did this mostly because I think the database will help researchers make more progress. IF the free offer s still there, people shoudl do it.
Posted 10/24/2014 1:03 PM (GMT -5)
@DBwithUC and AZYooper,

My personal opinion is, genetic and epigenetic connections of IBD are not yet crystal clear. According my 23andMe results, my odds of getting Crohn's are more than UC, and at this moment, my diagnosis is UC.
Posted 10/24/2014 2:28 PM (GMT -5)
Delta,

I did not do the 23andme health report as it wasn't available. I went through the promethus report and came to the conclusion that they really don't have any solid risk factors for UC . Crohns is better but you aren't going to get much help there either. They rank magnitudes and crohns tops out at 2.3(out of 4) which isn't much. The only magnitude above 2 for UC is a reduced risk they have connected to people with type 1 diabetes risk factor. I came out with a slightly increased risk for both UC and Crohns but increased risk has no real significance. Maybe like 1.05xnormal.

My mom and aunt signed up paid after I did because both have science interest and ancestory/geneology interests. I noticed both had the IBD questionnaire offered to them even though they do not have IBD. Could be because they are linked to me. Did you get the survey offered to you?

I did get some interesting information on statin drugs. I do not take them but many relatives do and most had severe issues with myopathy. They had to try different drugs by trial and error until they got one that did cause the problem. Well I have a rare homogenous mutation that increases the chance of myopathy for most but not all statins. 17x normal with a magnitude of 4. That type of information on UC drugs as far as predicting side effects and positive effects would really be valuable.
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