Abstract: Objective To investigate changes of intestinal flora in rats with acute liver injury induced by thioacetamide.Methods Sixteen SD rats were randomly divided into model group and normal control group with 8 rats in each group. Rats in the model group were subcutaneously injected with 600 mg/kg thioacetamide. Rats in the control control group were subcutaneously injected with the same dose of saline. The model was completed 48 hours later. Rat feces were collected for 16S rDNA sequencing of intestinal flora.Results The abundance and diversity of intestinal flora in the model group were significantly higher than those in the control group (P<0.05). At the level of phylum, the dominant phylum of the two groups were Firmicutes and Bacteroidetes, accounting for 61.25% and 32.48% respectively in the model group , 72.50% and 25.80% in the control group, but it was no statistical significance(P>0.05). The difference analysis of intestinal flora composition showed that the difference of Proteobacteria and Verrucomicrobia between the model group and the control group was statistically significant (P<0.05). At the level of genus, the abundance of Eubacterium, Akkermansia, Escherichia-Shigella, Ruminiclostridium and Clostridium_sensu_stricto in the model group was higher than that in the control group (P<0.05), and the abundance of Lactobacillus was lower than that in the control group (P<0.05).Conclusion The diversity, composition and abundance of intestinal flora of rats with acute injury caused by thioacetamide were significantly different from those of rats in the control group. There was obvious imbalance of intestinal flora structure.

Key words: Thioacetamide, Acute liver injury, Intestinal flora, 16S rDNA, High throughput sequencing