An assessment of potential biomarkers of environment enteropathy and its association with age and microbial infections among children in Bangladesh

• Published in: PloS one Vol. 16; no. 4; p. e0250446
• Main Authors: Uddin, Muhammad Ikhtear, Hossain, Motaher, Islam, Shahidul, Akter, Aklima, Nishat, Naoshin Sharmin, Nila, Tasnin Akter, Rafique, Tanzeem Ahmed, Leung, Daniel T, Calderwood, Stephen B, Ryan, Edward T, Harris, Jason B, LaRocque, Regina C, Bhuiyan, Taufiqur Rahman, Qadri, Firdausi
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States Public Library of Science 22.04.2021; Public Library of Science (PLoS)
• Subjects: Age; Antibodies - blood; Biology and Life Sciences; Biomarkers; Biomarkers - blood; Child, Preschool; Children; Children & youth; Cohort Studies; Colorectal diseases; Complications and side effects; Demographic aspects; Diarrhea; Diarrhea - blood; Diarrhea - microbiology; Diarrhea - parasitology; Diarrhea - virology; Editing; Electronic mail; Endotoxins - blood; Enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay; Feces; Feces - microbiology; Feces - parasitology; Feces - virology; Female; Funding; Gastrointestinal diseases; Gastrointestinal Diseases - blood; Gastrointestinal Diseases - microbiology; Gastrointestinal Diseases - parasitology; Gastrointestinal Diseases - virology; Gastrointestinal Tract - microbiology; Gastrointestinal Tract - pathology; Genetic aspects; Guardians; Hospitals; Humans; Hygiene; Immunology; Infant; Infant, Newborn; Infections; Infectious diseases; Islam; Laboratories; Lipopolysaccharide Receptors - blood; Male; Malnutrition; Medical schools; Medicine; Medicine and Health Sciences; Methodology; Microbiology; Microorganisms; Nutritional Status; Parasitic Diseases - blood; Parasitic Diseases - microbiology; Parasitic Diseases - parasitology; Parasitic Diseases - virology; Pathogens; Pediatrics; Permeability; Peroxidase - blood; Physiological aspects; Public health; Research and Analysis Methods; Reviews; Risk factors; Rotavirus; Salmonella; Sanitation; Software; Underweight; Viral infections; Virus Diseases - blood; Virus Diseases - virology; Viruses; Bangladesh; United States > US; Massachusetts
• ISSN: 1932-6203; 1932-6203
• DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0250446

Interventional studies targeting environment enteropathy (EE) are impeded by the lack of appropriate, validated, non-invasive biomarkers of EE. Thus, we aimed to validate the association of potential biomarkers for EE with enteric infections and nutritional status in a longitudinal birth cohort study. We measured endotoxin core antibody (EndoCab) and soluble CD14 (sCD14) in serum, and myeloperoxidase (MPO) in feces using commercially available enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) kits. We found that levels of serum EndoCab and sCD14 increase with the cumulative incidence of enteric infections. We observed a significant correlation between the fecal MPO level in the children at 24 months of age with the total number of bacterial and viral infections, the total number of parasitic infections, and the total number of diarrheal episodes and diarrheal duration. We observed that the levels of serum EndoCab, sCD14, and fecal MPO at 3 months of age were significantly associated with whether children were malnourished at 18 months of age or not. Biomarkers such as fecal MPO, serum EndoCab and sCD14 in children at an early age may be useful as a measure of cumulative burden of preceding enteric infections, which are predictive of subsequent malnutrition status and may be useful non-invasive biomarkers for EE.