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I have an unusual bacteria in my blood

Cheesus

Senior Member
Messages
1,292
Location
UK
Recently I performed some infectious disease testing using shotgun metagenomics. The idea is you sequence the DNA of everything in the sample then remove the human stuff and see what is left. It is a hypothesis free method of testing for pathogens, but it also creates a load of data that is not necessarily useful.

Amongst the many types of bacteria that was found in my blood, one stands out as particularly unusual:
Desemzia incerta. There is not a lot of information about it, but it was first isolated from an insect (the ovary of a cicada, no less). I cannot find any evidence that it has ever been isolated in a human sample before.

What do you guys think of that? On one hand, there are weird bacteria all over the place so this might have no significance whatsoever. On the other, I was wondering if I might find a vector borne infection, and here we have a bacteria associated with cicada ovaries (I don't remember ever having dealings with a cicada ovary, if that is what you're thinking).

Does anyone have any thoughts?
 

Hip

Senior Member
Messages
17,824
Except in cases of bacteremia, shouldn't the blood be largely free of bacteria?
 

erin

Senior Member
Messages
885
So strange. Never heard of such test and ovary of an insect can be in human blood. Where did you get this test done? I sit private? What exactly it is called?

Sorry, maybe asking too much. Ignore me if you don't want to answer.
 

Cheesus

Senior Member
Messages
1,292
Location
UK
So strange. Never heard of such test and ovary of an insect can be in human blood. Where did you get this test done? I sit private? What exactly it is called?

Sorry, maybe asking too much. Ignore me if you don't want to answer.

I had the test done at a lab called Aperiomics. If you google "shotgun metagenomics for infectious disease discovery" you will come across a lot of articles on the subject.

And it is a bacteria from the ovary, not the ovary itself! :D

That it's found in the ovaries of the cicada does sound similar to another bacteria, midichloria mitochondrii, being found in the ovaries of ticks. In the case of midichloria, it inhabits and consumes the mitochondria of the host.

What a strange yet interesting piece of information. Why on earth do you know that?
 

erin

Senior Member
Messages
885
I had the test done at a lab called Aperiomics. If you google "shotgun metagenomics for infectious disease discovery" you will come across a lot of articles on the subject.

And it is a bacteria from the ovary, not the ovary itself! :D

Thank you for the answer.
And about the ovary explanation :confused:
 

Hip

Senior Member
Messages
17,824
there is a thriving blood microbiome in healthy blood:

Are you sure "thriving" is the right word? I can imagine how the odd bacterium or two translocates into the blood from bacteria-filled places such as the gums, intestines, kidneys (if you have a recurrent upper UTI), and that these might be picked up by molecular methods of pathogen detection.

But does that equate to a "thriving" microbiome?


What kind of viral infections were found in your blood, by the way?

Incidentally, Dr Lipkin told me that high throughput sequencing of the blood will not detect the chronic enterovirus infections known to exist in ME/CFS patients, as you don't find much enterovirus in the blood in chronic infections; this virus is found only in the tissues (eg muscle tissues or gut tissues) in chronic infections.

So I don't think shotgun metagenomics of the blood will be able to tell you which enterovirus infections you have.
 

Cheesus

Senior Member
Messages
1,292
Location
UK
@Hip

You're right, thriving was probably not the right word. Though that first article i linked you to does seem to suggest that the blood microbiome may be integral to human health, so it might be more than simple translocation.

I didn't find any viruses in my blood. I found HHV 1 in my nasopharyngeal swab, but other than that I don't have any viruses to report. The test I ran was DNA, so I wouldn't capture any RNA viruses anyway. My main goal was to look for bacteria, because my ME was triggered when I took an antibiotic. It has always been my suspicion that I upset a harmony between various microbes.

I have attached my test results in case anyone is interested. The test only reported microbes with a relative abundance greater than 1%, but they have said that they can include microbes < 1% if I wish.
 

Attachments

  • Results.pdf
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Hip

Senior Member
Messages
17,824
It's too bad there's not yet metagenomics for tissue

It's possible that the people offering shotgun metagenomics might be able to process a tissue sample; one would have to write to them and ask; but getting such a sample is more difficult. The early enterovirus ME/CFS researchers often used to use muscle tissue biopsies to detect enterovirus, but these are invasive, painful and leave a scar. I believe that's one of the reasons Dr Chia pioneered stomach tissues biopsies, as these are actually easier to obtain, and are not painful.



I didn't find any viruses in my blood. I found HHV 1 in my nasopharyngeal swab, but other than that I don't have any viruses to report.

I wonder if that is normal for shotgun metagenomics, to only pick up so little viruses? Most of us will have HHV-6, EBV, perhaps cytomegalovirus and dozens of other viruses in our body.
 

Jesse2233

Senior Member
Messages
1,942
Location
Southern California
This is fascinating technology and I'm glad you did this Cheesus

My question is what this can determine diagnostically and treatment even if it's tissue

If we discover enteroviruses plus herpes viruses in our gut then what does this tell us about pathological etiology. This is something I've wondered about Chia's research. Perhaps an altered immune system or metabolism allows for higher levels of the virus as a secondary effect

I suppose if a new retrovirus was found at much higher levels that would be significant

Did they give you an option to look at RNA viruses as well?
 

Cheesus

Senior Member
Messages
1,292
Location
UK
I wonder if that is normal for shotgun metagenomics, to only pick up so little viruses? Most of us will have HHV-6, EBV, perhaps cytomegalovirus and dozens of other viruses in our body.

I have an appointment to speak with the lab about the results, so I will ask them this.

Did they give you an option to look at RNA viruses as well?

Yes, you can do RNA sequencing, but it is a separate test and is quite a lot more expensive (it was already very expensive).
 

Cheesus

Senior Member
Messages
1,292
Location
UK
I was diagnosed with this tick-borne infection. Actually, the blood sample was analyzed at the University hospital in Liege in Belgium. KDM ordered it for me. You may PM me if you´d like to know more as this is a bit off topic.

I'm still interested. Have you successfully treated it? Did you benefit from treatment?