Laboratory of Probiogenomics, Department of Chemistry, Life Sciences and Environmental Sustainability, University of Parma, Parma, Italy.
Interdepartmental Research Centre "Microbiome Research Hub", University of Parma, Parma, 43124, Italy.
Environ Microbiol. 2021 Mar;23(3):1780-1792. doi: 10.1111/1462-2920.15441. Epub 2021 Feb 28.
The human vaginal environment harbours a community of bacteria that plays an important role in maintaining vaginal health and in protecting this environment from various urogenital infections. This bacterial population, also known as vaginal microbiota, has been demonstrated to be dominated by members of the Lactobacillus genus. Several studies employing 16S rRNA gene-based amplicon sequencing have classified the vaginal microbiota into five distinct community state types (CSTs) or vaginotypes. To deepen our understanding of the vaginal microbiota we performed an in-depth meta-analysis of 1312 publicly available datasets concerning healthy vaginal microbiome information obtained by metagenomics sequencing. The analysis confirmed the predominance of taxa belonging to the Lactobacillus genus, followed by members of the genera Gardnerella, Vibrio and Atopobium. Moreover, the statistical robustness offered by this meta-analysis allowed us to disentangle the species-level composition of dominant and accessory taxa constituting each vaginotype and to revisit and refine the previously proposed CST classification. In addition, a functional characterization of the metagenomic datasets revealed particular genetic features associated with each assigned vaginotype.
人体阴道环境中栖息着一群细菌，它们在维持阴道健康和保护该环境免受各种泌尿生殖系感染方面发挥着重要作用。这个细菌群体，也被称为阴道微生物群，已经被证明主要由乳杆菌属的成员组成。几项使用基于 16S rRNA 基因扩增子测序的研究将阴道微生物群分为五种不同的群落状态类型（CSTs）或阴道型。为了更深入地了解阴道微生物群，我们对 1312 个公开的数据集进行了深入的荟萃分析，这些数据集涉及通过宏基因组测序获得的健康阴道微生物组信息。该分析证实了属于乳杆菌属的分类群的优势，其次是加德纳菌属、弧菌属和阿托波氏菌属的成员。此外，这项荟萃分析提供的统计稳健性使我们能够分辨出构成每个阴道型的主要和辅助分类群的种水平组成，并重新审视和改进先前提出的 CST 分类。此外，对宏基因组数据集的功能特征分析揭示了与每个指定阴道型相关的特定遗传特征。
