A study of the bacteria associated with advancing periodontitis in man

Abstract

Samples of apical plaque were taken by means of an anaerobic gas-flushed syringe from 21 sites in eight patients. The samples were anaerobically dispersed, diluted and plated and incubated in an atmosphere of 80% N2, 10% H2 and 10% CO2 for 7-21 days. All colonies on plates containing 20-50 isolates were picked, repeatedly restreaked, characterized and identified where possible by a probabilistic computer identification program. The sites were divided into four groups on the basis of clinical features. The significance of differences between bacterial populations in the groups was determined by the Kruskal Wallis and Mann-Whitney U tests, while the Spearman rank correlation coefficient was used to determine the rank correlation of clinical features of diseases and microbial species. The subgingival microbiota in advanced destructive sites was predominated by Gram-negative rods. The microbiota of two young adult patients with generalized extensive bone loss, extensive clinical inflammation and suppuration was dominated by Bacteroides asaccharolyticus and an organism with characteristics consistent with Actinobacillus actinomycetemcomitans. The predominant cultivable microbiota in two patients with extensive bone loss but minimal clinical inflammation was predominated by Bacteroides melaninogenicus ss intermedius and Eikenella corrodens in one patient and E. corrodens and a slow growing fusiform-shaped Bacteroides in a second patient. A third group of four patients demonstrated moderate levels of clinical inflammation and evidence of continued bone loss in the last year. Predominant organisms in this group were more heterogeneous and included B. asaccharolyticus, Fusobacterium nucleatum, the "fusiform" Bacteroides and anaerobic vibrios. Sites with minimal disease in the patients revealed higher proportions of Gram-positive organisms including Rothia dentocariosa, Actinomyces naeslundii and Actinomyces viscosus. A positive rank correlation could be detected between clinical inflammation including suppuration and B. asaccharolyticus and a negative rank correlation between inflammation and E. corrodens.

Cytotoxic Activity of Bacteroides Gingivalis and Bacteroides Asaccharolyticus

“…Representatives of Bacteroides melaninogenicus have been isolated from disease processes in the mouth (Spiegel et al, 1979) and from other sites (Smith, 1975;Finegold, 1977). B. gingivalis, which is composed of mainly oral strains that were formerly assigned to B. asaccharolyticus (Coykendall, Kaczmarek and Slots, 1980;van Steenbergen, Vlaanderen and de Graaff, 1981), seems to be very important in adult periodontitis (Slots, 1979;Spiegel et a!., 1979;Tanner et al, 1979). The strains still classed as B. asaccharolyticus can be isolated from infections away from the mouth (Smith, 1975;Finegold, 1977).…”

Plasmid-mediated genomic recombination at the pilin gene locus enhances the N-acetyl-d-galactosamine-specific haemagglutination activity and the growth rate of Eikenella corrodens

“…Eikenella corrodens is a Gram-negative, facultatively anaerobic, rod-shaped bacterium; it is predominantly found in subgingival plaque in patients with advanced periodontitis (Tanner et al, 1979). This bacterium can also be pathogenic, causing a variety of soft-tissue and wound infections (Chen & Wilson, 1992), such as endocarditis (Decker et al, 1986) and other opportunistic infections.…”

Dysbiosis and Alterations in Predicted Functions of the Subgingival Microbiome in Chronic Periodontitis

“…Early studies using culture-based techniques were labor-intensive (21), and many organisms remained uncultivable despite improvements in culturing techniques (22). Subsequent molecular approaches based on DNA-DNA hybridization and microarray techniques substantially improved our understanding of these microbial communities (23)(24)(25)(26)(27).…”