Subgingival microbiome and clinical periodontal status in an elderly cohort: The WHICAP ancillary study of oral health

Abstract

Background: There is a sparsity of data describing the periodontal microbiome in elderly individuals. We analyzed the association of subgingival bacterial profiles and clinical periodontal status in a cohort of participants in the Washington Heights-Inwood Columbia Aging Project (WHICAP). Methods: Dentate individuals underwent a full-mouth periodontal examination at six sites/tooth. Up to four subgingival plaque samples per person, each obtained from the mesio-lingual site of the most posterior tooth in each quadrant, were harvested and pooled. Periodontal status was classified according to the Centers for Disease Control/American Academy of Periodontology (CDC/AAP) criteria as well as based on the percentage of teeth/person with pockets ≥4 mm deep. Bacterial DNA was isolated and was processed and analyzed using Human Oral Microbe Identification using Next Generation Sequencing (HOMINGS). Differential abundance across the periodontal phenotypes was calculated using the R package DESeq2. α-and β-diversity metrics were calculated using DADA2based clustering. Results: The mean age of the 739 participants was 74.5 years, and 32% were male. Several taxa including Sneathia amnii-like sp., Peptoniphilaceae [G-1] bacterium HMT 113, Porphyromonas gingivalis, Fretibacterium fastidiosum, Filifactor alocis, and Saccharibacteria (TM7) [G-1] bacterium HMT 346 were more abundant with increasing severity of periodontitis. In contrast, species such as Veillonella parvula, Veillonella dispar, Rothia dentocariosa, and Lautropia mirabilis were more abundant in health. Microbial diversity increased in parallel with the severity and extent of periodontitis. Conclusions: The observed subgingival bacterial patterns in these elderly individuals corroborated corresponding findings in younger cohorts and were consistent with the concept that periodontitis is associated with perturbations in the resident microbiome.

Gingival transcriptomics of follicular T cell footprints in progressing periodontitis

“…As we noted, these substantive changes in the footprint of genes related to Tfh functions, it must be recognized that these changes result from alterations in the quality and quantity of the microbiome at disease sites and the resulting clinical changes reflecting the disease process. The current paradigm in periodontitis is the transition from a healthy symbiotic microbiome to a dysbiotic microbiome at disease sites [93–97]. This dysbiosis reflects altered biology of both pathogens and commensals in the disease ecology, the summation of which drives host response changes, dysregulates these responses and triggers tissue changes of periodontitis.…”

In-Silico Evaluation and Selection of the Best 16S rRNA Gene Primers for Use in Next-Generation Sequencing to Detect Oral Bacteria and Archaea.

“…The first of these, as part of the Socransky green complex, has traditionally been associated with periodontal health; the remaining three are components of the orange complex, which is related to periodontitis (53). A further three bacteria commonly found in the healthy periodontium, Leptotrichia bucalis (54), Leptotrichia hofstadii (54) and Rothia dentocariosa (55,56), were also missed by some of the primer pairs. Conversely, a few failed to cover bacterial taxa isolated from periodontallydiseased sites (in teeth or implants) or those regarded as novel periodontal pathogens, 74) and ancient dental calculus (75,76).…”

Oral microbiome interactions with gingival gene expression patterns for apoptosis, autophagy and hypoxia pathways in progressing periodontitis

“…However, one limitation of these cross‐sectional studies is the lack of clinical markers to identify the phase of the individual periodontal lesions, 82–84 which would be expected to contribute to the heterogeneity of the transcriptome and loss of some power in the final analysis and interpretation. In contrast to these investigations, numerous reports have document changes in the oral microbiome in periodontitis versus health, 19,85–87 affected by various modifying factors, 3,88–92 and comparing starting and ending microbiomes in stable versus progressing sites 93 . The studies generally have not provided any insights into the local host responses to these microbial changes.…”