Gut microbiota profiling in injection drug users with and without HIV-1 infection in Puerto Rico

Our findings indicate that the HIV-positive group exhibited a higher abundance of ASVs belonging to the genera <i>Prevotella</i>, <i>Alloprevotella</i>, <i>Sutterella</i>, <i>Megasphaera</i>, <i>Fusobacterium</i>, and <i>Mitsuokella</i>. However, Bifidobacteria and <i>Lactobacillus</i> ASVs were more abundant in injectors than in non-injectors. We examined the effect of drug use on the gut microbiome in both HIV-infected and non-infected patients, and found that multiple drug use significantly affected the microbial community composition. Analysis of differential of bacterial taxa revealed an enrichment of <i>Bifidobacterium</i> spp.<i>, Faecalibacterium</i> spp., and <i>Lactobacillus</i> spp. in the multiple drug-injecting group. However, in the non-injecting group, <i>Parabacteroides</i> spp., <i>Prevotella</i> spp., <i>Paraprevotella</i> spp., <i>Sutterella</i> spp., <i>and Lachnoclostridium</i> spp. The presence of multiple drug-injecting groups was observed to be more prevalent. Our findings provide detailed insight into ASV-level changes in the microbiome in response to HIV and drug use, suggesting that the effect of HIV status and drug injection may have different effects on microbiome composition and in modulating gut bacterial populations.