Abstract
Human saliva microbiota is phylogenetically divergent among host individuals yet their roles in health and disease are poorly appreciated. We employed a microbial functional gene microarray, HuMiChip 1.0, to reconstruct the global functional profiles of human saliva microbiota from ten healthy and ten caries-active adults. Saliva microbiota in the pilot population featured a vast diversity of functional genes. No significant distinction in gene number or diversity indices was observed between healthy and caries-active microbiota. However, co-presence network analysis of functional genes revealed that caries-active microbiota was more divergent in non-core genes than healthy microbiota, despite both groups exhibited a similar degree of conservation at their respective core genes. Furthermore, functional gene structure of saliva microbiota could potentially distinguish caries-active patients from healthy hosts. Microbial functions such as Diaminopimelate epimerase, Prephenate dehydrogenase, Pyruvate-formate lyase and N-acetylmuramoyl-L-alanine amidase were significantly linked to caries. Therefore, saliva microbiota carried disease-associated functional signatures, which could be potentially exploited for caries diagnosis.
Highlights
Caries is the most common infectious disease throughout the world [1]
Evidences have recently emerged from our group and others that the organismal structure of saliva microbiota is highly individualized among human hosts [3,4,5,6,7,8] and that changes in organismal structure are linked to caries [9], gingivitis [10] and periodontitis [11]
Our results showed that the functional gene structure of saliva microbiota is able to distinguish caries-active patients from healthy hosts, suggesting that the structure and selected microbial functional gene markers can be potentially exploited for caries diagnosis and perturbation
Summary
Caries is the most common infectious disease throughout the world [1]. Lesions and cavities on tooth surfaces, caused by caries activity, result in infection and pain and can lead to decay and even the loss of tooth structure. Evidences have recently emerged from our group and others that the organismal structure of saliva microbiota is highly individualized among human hosts [3,4,5,6,7,8] and that changes in organismal structure are linked to caries [9], gingivitis [10] and periodontitis [11]. The functional characteristics of saliva microbiota are not well understood [12] and the potential roles of saliva microbiota in health and diseases remain elusive, as (i) organismal lineages do not necessarily correlate with functional activities; (ii) many organisms in a given microbiota are either novel or uncultured; (iii) the degree of microbial functional divergence among host individuals is presently unknown
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