16S rRNA gene amplicon sequencing of esophageal microbiome in cancer patients and healthy controls
This study aimed to characterize the microbial community composition associated with different clinical stages of esophageal cancer and compare it with normal esophageal tissue. A total of 63 samples were collected, including 29 normal esophageal tissue samples from healthy controls and 34 esophageal cancer tissue samples at varying clinical stages (stage I, n=3; stage II, n=11; stage III, n=10; stage IV, n=10). The 16S rRNA gene hypervariable regions were amplified by PCR and sequenced on the Illumina NovaSeq platform using paired-end 250 bp reads (PE250). Raw reads were quality filtered and merged, followed by amplicon sequence variant (ASV) inference using Deblur implemented in QIIME 2. Taxonomic classification, alpha and beta diversity analyses, and differential abundance testing were performed to identify cancer-associated and stage-specific microbial signatures. This dataset provides insights into the relationship between esophageal microbiome composition and cancer progression.