Insights into microbiome research 1: How to choose appropriate controls for a microbiome study in MS?

Abstract

Microbiome studies are on the rise, but appropriate measures must be taken into account to reduce potential confounders that could obscure results. Among these are diet, age, sex, geography, and even the presence of house pets. In the particular case of multiple sclerosis (MS), the influence of disease-modifying therapy must also be considered. Thus, selecting an appropriate group of controls can substantially increase the statistical power of a microbiome study. Furthermore, given the enormous complexity and volatility of the microbiome, this could be the deciding factor between reporting signal and simply noise.