Abstract
Despite widely used preventive measures such as sealant programs to control caries prevalence, disparities are seen among ethnic groups. Supragingival plaque harbors hundreds of bacterial species, playing a significant role in oral health and disease. It is unknown whether the ethnic variation influences the supragingival microbiota in children. In our study, variations in microbiota of the supragingival plaque was investigated from 96 children between 6 and 11 years old in four ethnic groups (African American, Burmese, Caucasian, and Hispanic) from the same geographic location by 16S rRNA gene sequencing. We found that the microbial alpha and beta diversity of supragingival microbiota significantly differed between ethnic groups. The supragingival plaque microbiota had the most complex microbial community in Burmese children. Within-group microbiota similarity in Burmese or Caucasian children was significantly higher than between-groups similarity. We identified seven ethnic group-specific bacterial taxa after adjusting for dental plaque index, decayed missing filled teeth (DMFT) and the frequency of brushing. Children with high plaque index and high DMFT values were more similar to each other in the overall microbial community, compared to low plaque index or low DMFT groups in which inter-subject variation is high. Several bacterial taxa associated with high plaque index or high DMFT were ethnic group-specific. These results demonstrated that supragingival microbiota differed among ethnicity groups in children.
Highlights
Despite widely used preventive measures such as sealant programs to control caries prevalence, disparities are seen among ethnic groups
(1) whether the supragingival microbiota in children differs by ethnicity and (2) whether ethnicity-associated microbial variation contributes to the dental health disparities, the decayed missing and filled teeth (DMFT) and plaque index (PI)
To address the health disparities in the prevalence of dental caries, our study determined the microbiota profile of the supragingival plaque among 96 children from different ethnicity groups
Summary
Despite widely used preventive measures such as sealant programs to control caries prevalence, disparities are seen among ethnic groups. In addition to environmental factors such as d iet[2,3], birth mode[4] and geographical location[5], host genetics[6,7,8] plays an important role in configuring the microbiome community structure and determining pathogenic species associated with dental caries These findings are in line with clinical observations that susceptibility to dental caries and periodontal diseases differs by e thnicity[9,10,11]. (1) whether the supragingival microbiota in children differs by ethnicity and (2) whether ethnicity-associated microbial variation contributes to the dental health disparities, the decayed missing and filled teeth (DMFT) and plaque index (PI). The outcome of the study will expand our knowledge of ethnic association of oral microbiota in caries risk and bring to light the need for group-targeted or individualized prevention strategies
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