Figure legends
Figure 1. Boxplots illustrating Shannon diversity in bacterial microbiomes of healthy controls (HC) and vernal keratoconjunctivitis (VKC) patients in relation to the presence of serum IgE (A), type of VKC (B), type of feeding (C) and history of atopic dermatitis in the first year of life (D). Median values (horizontal line) and interquartile ranges have been indicated in the plots.
Figure 2. Three-dimensional Principal Coordinates Analysis (PCoA) based on weighted UniFrac distances. A: subjects with (yellow circles) and without history of atopic dermatitis in the first year of life (red circles); B: subjects with a history of breastfeeding (blue circles) and formula feeding (red circle); C: VKC patients with the lowest QUICK scores (0-45; yellow circles), intermediate scores (45-60; orange circles) and highest score (>90; red circles).
Figure 3 . Pie charts showing the mean relative abundance of the predominant bacterial phyla in VKC (A) and HC samples (B).
Figure 4. ANCOM volcano plot. The W value represents the number of times of the null-hypothesis (the average abundance of a given species in a group is equal to that in the other group) was rejected for a given species. The x-axis value represents the centered log ratio (clr) transformed mean difference in abundance of a given species between VKC and HC groups. A positive x-axis means a species is abundant in HC group and a negative x-axis value means a species is abundant in VKC group.
Figure 5 . Pie charts showing the mean relative abundance of the predominant bacterial genera in VKC (A) and healthy controls (B) samples. “Other” includes genera with <1% mean abundance.
Figure 6 . Pie charts showing the mean relative abundance of the predominant fungal families in VKC (A) and healthy control (B) samples. “Other” includes genera with <1% mean abundance.