Institute for Genome Sciences, University of Maryland School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD 21201, USA.
Sci Transl Med. 2012 May 2;4(132):132ra52. doi: 10.1126/scitranslmed.3003605.
Elucidating the factors that impinge on the stability of bacterial communities in the vagina may help in predicting the risk of diseases that affect women's health. Here, we describe the temporal dynamics of the composition of vaginal bacterial communities in 32 reproductive-age women over a 16-week period. The analysis revealed the dynamics of five major classes of bacterial communities and showed that some communities change markedly over short time periods, whereas others are relatively stable. Modeling community stability using new quantitative measures indicates that deviation from stability correlates with time in the menstrual cycle, bacterial community composition, and sexual activity. The women studied are healthy; thus, it appears that neither variation in community composition per se nor higher levels of observed diversity (co-dominance) are necessarily indicative of dysbiosis.
阐明影响阴道细菌群落稳定性的因素，可能有助于预测影响女性健康的疾病的风险。在这里，我们描述了 32 名育龄妇女在 16 周内阴道细菌群落组成的时间动态。分析揭示了五类主要细菌群落的动态，并表明一些群落在短时间内发生明显变化，而另一些群落则相对稳定。使用新的定量指标来模拟群落稳定性表明，偏离稳定性与月经周期、细菌群落组成和性活动有关。所研究的女性是健康的；因此，群落组成的变化本身，或者观察到的更高水平的多样性（共同优势）并不一定表明失调。
