The gut microbiota, IL8, craving and sociability in AUD

Background: A fraction of the population of AUD patients present with abnormal gut microbiota composition. Transplanting the gut microbiota of AUD patients to mice induce a deficit in sociability. The aim of this study is to better characterise the clinical and in particular social impairments of AUD patients presenting with an abnormal gut microbiota. Methods: 50 severe AUD patients and 14 healthy subjects (HS) were tested on their first day of alcohol withdrawal for the composition of the gut microbiota (16S Illumina), for plasma cytokine levels and for various behavioural markers including depression (BDI), anxiety (STAI), alcohol craving (OCDS) and various dimensions associated to sociability (sociability questionnaire of the TEIQUE, social cognition measured with a standardized visual perspective task, extent of the social network measured by a sociogram). Results: 35% of patients presented with a dysbiosis, while for the remaining 65%, the composition was matching that of controls basing on PCoA using the component scores of each patient and dysbiosis considered as present when scores deviated by more than 1.65 SD from the HS group. Dysbiotic patients presented with higher IL-8 levels, but also with higher craving scores, lower scores of sociability at the Teique, a decreased tendency to pay attention to others at the visual perspective task and a decrease in the size and richness of the social network measured at the sociogram. Conclusion: the richness and diversity of gut microbiota composition is consistently and robustly associated with the sociability parameters in sAUD patients