Cold environment is associated with worse outcomes in ischemic stroke patients and the underlying gut microbial mechanism.

Overview

1. Department of Neurology, The Second Hospital of Tianjin Medical University, No.23, PingJiang Road, Tianjin, 300211 China
2. Department of Geriatrics, The Second Hospital of Tianjin Medical University, No.23, PingJiang Road, Tianjin, 300211 China
3. Tianjin Interdisciplinary Innovation Centre for Health and Meteorology, Tianjin, China

Abstract

Background: Increasing evidence suggests that cold environment is a potential risk factor for acute ischemic stroke (AIS) and is associated with poor prognosis, however, its underlying mechanisms remain unclear. Since gut dysbiosis and AIS are causally related and cold environment can induce changes in the gut microbiota, we wondered whether cold-season-related gut dysbiosis aggravates stroke progression.

Methods: In total, 101 patients with AIS were enrolled and divided into two groups: cold-season onset ischemic stroke (CIS) and non-cold-season onset ischemic stroke (NCIS). Gut microbiota composition was analyzed using 16 S rRNA gene sequencing, and signature taxa were identified via linear discriminant analysis effect size (LEfSe). Correlations between key microbial taxa and clinical parameters were assessed using Spearman rank analysis. To evaluate the potential causal role of gut microbiota in cold season stroke, fecal microbiota transplantation (FMT) was performed in mice, followed by middle cerebral artery occlusion (MCAO).

Results: The composition of gut microbiota in the CIS group significantly differed from the NCIS group. The characteristic microbiota of the CIS group was distinguished by an elevated relative abundance of Escherichia-Shigella and Enterococcus, coupled with a decreased percentage of Blautia, Eubacterium_hallii_group, Subdoligranulum, Dorea, Faecalibacterium, Ruminococcus, and Collinsella. Furthermore, Escherichia-Shigella, Enterococcus, Blautia, Eubacterium_hallii_group and Faecalibacterium showed predictive value for 3-month poor prognosis in patients. Compared with mice inoculated with the NCIS gut microbiota, mice inoculated with the CIS gut microbiota showed more severe brain damage, impaired intestinal barrier function, and higher levels of inflammatory factors after the stroke model was established.

Conclusions: Our study indicates that cold-season-related gut dysbiosis may be linked to stroke severity and poor prognosis in AIS patients, suggesting that modulation of gut microbiota could represent a potential avenue for therapeutic intervention.

Supplementary Information: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12866-026-05013-8.

Reproduced under the paper's license (CC BY), from the paper cited above.

Code

The paper links to its data, not to its authors' code: see the Data section.

Tracing map

A tracing map links a paper to the code its authors published: this paper has none, so it has no map.

Data

Datasets cited

• bioproject:PRJNA1274352, at NCBI BioProject; found in “Data availability”

Data availability

The raw sequencing data generated in this study have been deposited in the NCBI Sequence Read Archive (SRA) database and are publicly available under the BioProject accession numbers PRJNA1274352 and PRJNA1275799. All sequencing runs (SRR accession numbers) can be accessed through the SRA database via the following links: (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sra/?term=PRJNA1274352) (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sra/?term=PRJNA1275799).

Reproduced under the paper's license (CC BY), from the paper cited above.

Versions

The history of this record: each version stored by the harvester or made by a correction of its authors or of the maintainers of its code, and what changed in its facts. The texts of the paper (its abstract, its availability statements) are not part of it; versions that changed only those are not listed.

Version 1, 28 September 2026: the first record

Recorded: type, language, journal, volume, issue, pages, dates, 6 authors, 5 keywords, 19 MeSH terms, 6 funders, 54 references.

Cite

This paper

Wei, C., Zhou, X., Xia, X., Feng, W., Wang, L., & Li, X. (2026). Cold environment is associated with worse outcomes in ischemic stroke patients and the underlying gut microbial mechanism. BMC microbiology, 26(1), 465. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12866-026-05013-8

Similar papers

The papers with a page that share the most with this one: the tools found in their code, their categories, datasets, cited references and authors, the rarest counting most.

[1] doi:10.1128/msystems.00149-26

Effects of gut microbiota on the susceptibility of ischemic stroke in mice.

Journal: mSystems

In common: stroke, mouse, 4 references

[2] doi:10.3389/fmed.2025.1702025

Diagnostic value of gut microbiota profiling and circulating biomarkers to predict post-stroke infection in acute ischemic stroke.

Journal: Frontiers in medicine

In common: stroke, clinical / translational, 1 reference

[3] doi:10.1016/j.redox.2026.104253

Ursodeoxycholic acid mitigates cerebral ischemia/reperfusion injury by inhibiting thrombin-induced lipid peroxidation through activation of ALDH3A1.

Journal: Redox biology

In common: stroke, mouse, 1 reference

[4] doi:10.1162/imag.a.1328 [code]

A robust and reproducible automated MRI pipeline for quantifying tissue outcomes after experimental stroke in multi-center preclinical networks.

Journal: Imaging neuroscience (Cambridge, Mass.)

In common: stroke, 1 reference

[5] doi:10.3390/antiox15070882

<i>Lactobacillus reuteri</i> DSM 17938 and Its Supernatant Ameliorate Parkinson's Disease in Association with Modulation of Gut Microbiota and Its Tryptophan Metabolism.

Journal: Antioxidants (Basel, Switzerland)

In common: clinical / translational, mouse, 1 reference

[6] doi:10.1093/hmg/ddag024 [code]

A microbiome quantitative trait locus in SLC39A8 modulates disease severity in synucleinopathy-induced models of Parkinson's disease.

Journal: Human molecular genetics

In common: mouse, 1 reference

[7] doi:10.1016/j.isci.2026.116622 [code]

Multi-omics profiling reveals gut microbiome signatures associated with cognitive decline in Alzheimer's disease.

Journal: iScience

In common: clinical / translational, 1 reference

[8] doi:10.3389/fmicb.2026.1811435

Research on the role of gut microbiota metabolites in autism by multi-omics and network pharmacology.

Journal: Frontiers in microbiology

In common: mouse, 1 reference

[9] doi:10.3389/fphar.2026.1790866

Akkermansia muciniphila improving depression-like behaviors by regulating glycerophospholipid metabolism in gut-brain axis.

Journal: Frontiers in pharmacology

In common: mouse, 1 reference

[10] doi:10.3389/frmbi.2026.1834726 [code]

Shotgun metagenomic analysis reveals taxonomic and functional alterations in the gut microbiome across prodromal and symptomatic Lewy body disease.

Journal: Frontiers in microbiomes

In common: 1 reference

Contribute

The authors of this paper can claim it, correct its record and validate its tracing map, and the maintainers of its code (its owner, or a public member of its organization) correct what it says of their repository; anyone signed in can ask for its removal. Every request goes to OSCR's own machine, which answers it; your account page follows them.

Request its removal

To ask OSCR to remove this record, the copies of its authors' scripts or its tracing map, use the removal request page: signed in, you say who you are, what to remove and why, then review and confirm the request. Published rules decide every request (how).

Discussion: questions and error reports about this paper and its code, from signed-in readers and its authors. It opens with sign-in.

Reproductions: reports from readers who ran the authors' code: what they reproduced, with which environment, commit and data. It opens with sign-in.

Activity: what happens around this paper: new versions of its record, its map's validation, discussions and reproductions. It opens with sign-in.