Oerlemans Eline F M, Wuyts Sander, Bellen Gert, Wittouck Stijn, De Boeck Ilke, Ruban Kateryna, Allonsius Camille Nina, van den Broek Marianne F L, Donders Gilbert G G, Lebeer Sarah
Department of Bioscience Engineering, Research Group Environmental Ecology and Applied Microbiology, University of Antwerp, Groenenborgerlaan 171, B-2020 Antwerp, Belgium.
Femicare VZW, Clinical Research for Women, Gasthuismolenstraat 33, B-3300 Tienen, Belgium.
Diagnostics (Basel). 2020 Oct 28;10(11):879. doi: 10.3390/diagnostics10110879.
While bacterial vaginosis (BV) is a well-known type of vaginal dysbiosis, aerobic vaginitis (AV) is an inflammatory condition that remains understudied and under-recognised. It predisposes women to serious complications including urogenital infections and pregnancy problems. Here, we investigated the bacterial community in AV to explore its possible role in AV pathogenesis. We collected vaginal lavage fluid samples of women ( = 58) classified by wet-mount microscopy as suffering from AV or BV and included an asymptomatic reference group without signs of AV or BV. AV samples showed reduced absolute abundances of bacteria in general and specifically of lactobacilli by qPCR, but gene sequencing and amplicon sequence variant analysis revealed that remained the dominant taxon in 25% of the AV samples studied. The other AV samples showed high relative abundances of and, unexpectedly, the anaerobes and in more than half of the AV samples studied. Yet, despite increased relative abundance of these potential pathogens or pathobionts in the AV bacterial communities, the AV samples only slightly stimulated Toll-like receptor 4 and showed reduced activation of Toll-like receptor 2/6, receptors of two pathways central to mucosal immunity. Our findings indicate that the reduced total bacterial abundance with associated enrichment in certain pathobionts in AV might be mainly a consequence of the inflammatory conditions and/or altered hormonal regulation rather than bacteria being a major cause of the inflammation.
虽然细菌性阴道病（BV）是一种众所周知的阴道生态失调类型，但需氧菌性阴道炎（AV）是一种研究不足且认识不足的炎症性疾病。它使女性易患包括泌尿生殖系统感染和妊娠问题在内的严重并发症。在此，我们研究了AV中的细菌群落，以探讨其在AV发病机制中的可能作用。我们收集了通过湿片显微镜检查分类为患有AV或BV的女性（n = 58）的阴道灌洗液样本，并纳入了一个无AV或BV体征的无症状参考组。通过qPCR分析，AV样本总体上显示细菌绝对丰度降低，特别是乳酸杆菌的丰度降低，但16S rRNA基因测序和扩增子序列变异分析显示，在所研究的25%的AV样本中，乳酸杆菌仍然是优势分类群。其他AV样本显示出较高的相对丰度，出乎意料的是，在所研究的一半以上的AV样本中检测到了兼性厌氧菌和专性厌氧菌。然而，尽管这些潜在病原体或致病共生菌在AV细菌群落中的相对丰度增加，但AV样本仅轻微刺激Toll样受体4，并显示出Toll样受体2/6（黏膜免疫两条核心途径的受体）的激活减少。我们的研究结果表明，AV中细菌总丰度降低以及某些致病共生菌的相关富集可能主要是炎症状态和/或激素调节改变的结果，而不是细菌成为炎症的主要原因。
