A multi-omics spatial framework for host-microbiome dissection within the intestinal tissue microenvironment.

Nature communications
Authors
Abstract

The intricate interactions between the host immune system and its microbiome constituents undergo dynamic shifts in response to perturbations to the intestinal tissue environment. Our ability to study these events on the systems level is significantly limited by in situ approaches capable of generating simultaneous insights from both host and microbial communities. Here, we introduce Microbiome Cartography (MicroCart), a framework for simultaneous in situ probing of host and microbiome across multiple spatial modalities. We demonstrate MicroCart by investigating gut host and microbiome changes in a murine colitis model, using spatial proteomics, transcriptomics, and glycomics. Our findings reveal a global but systematic transformation in tissue immune responses, encompassing tissue-level remodeling in response to host immune and epithelial cell state perturbations, bacterial population shifts, localized inflammatory responses, and metabolic process alterations during colitis. MicroCart enables a deep investigation of the intricate interplay between the host tissue and its microbiome with spatial multi-omics.

Year of Publication
2025
Journal
Nature communications
Volume
16
Issue
1
Pages
1230
Date Published
01/2025
ISSN
2041-1723
DOI
10.1038/s41467-025-56237-7
PubMed ID
39890778
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