Department of Microbiology and Immunology, University of Rochester School of Medicine and Dentistry, Rochester, NY, USA; Department of Pediatrics, University of Rochester School of Medicine and Dentistry, Rochester, NY, USA.
Department of Biostatistics and Computational Biology, University of Rochester School of Medicine and Dentistry, Rochester, NY, USA.
J Affect Disord. 2025 Jan 1;368:410-419. doi: 10.1016/j.jad.2024.09.108. Epub 2024 Sep 16.
Composition of the vaginal microbiome in pregnancy is associated with adverse maternal, obstetric, and child health outcomes. Therefore, identifying sources of individual differences in the vaginal microbiome is of considerable clinical and public health interest. The current study tested the hypothesis that vaginal microbiome composition during pregnancy is associated with an individual's experience of affective symptoms and stress exposure.
Data were based on a prospective longitudinal study of a medically healthy community sample of 275 mother-infant pairs. Affective symptoms and stress exposure and select measures of associated biomarkers (diurnal salivary cortisol, serum measures of sex hormones) were collected at each trimester; self-report, clinical, and medical records were used to collect detailed data on socio-demographic factors and health behavior, including diet and sleep. Vaginal microbiome samples were collected in the third trimester (34-40 weeks) and characterized by 16S rRNA sequencing. Identified taxa were clustered into three community clusters (CC1-3) based on dissimilarity of vaginal microbiota composition.
Results indicate that depressive symptoms during pregnancy were reliably associated with individual taxa and CC3 in the third trimester. Prediction of functional potential from 16S taxonomy revealed a differential abundance of metabolic pathways in CC1-3 and individual taxa, including biosynthetic pathways for serotonin and dopamine. We did not find robust evidence linking symptom- and stress-related biomarkers and CCs.
Our results provide further evidence of how prenatal psychological distress during pregnancy alters the maternal-fetal microbiome ecosystem that may be important for understanding maternal and child health outcomes.
妊娠期间阴道微生物组的组成与不良的母婴、产科和儿童健康结局有关。因此，确定阴道微生物组中个体差异的来源具有重要的临床和公共卫生意义。本研究检验了这样一个假设，即妊娠期间阴道微生物组的组成与个体的情感症状和应激暴露经历有关。
数据基于对 275 对母婴进行的前瞻性纵向研究，这些母婴来自一个医学健康的社区样本。在每个孕期都采集了情感症状和应激暴露以及相关生物标志物（日间唾液皮质醇、血清性激素测量值）的选择测量值；使用自我报告、临床和病历收集了有关社会人口因素和健康行为的详细数据，包括饮食和睡眠。在第三个孕期（34-40 周）采集阴道微生物组样本，并通过 16S rRNA 测序进行特征描述。基于阴道微生物组成的相似性，将鉴定出的分类群聚类为三个群落聚类（CC1-3）。
结果表明，妊娠期间的抑郁症状与第三个孕期的个体分类群和 CC3 存在可靠关联。从 16S 分类学预测功能潜力表明，CC1-3 和个体分类群中存在代谢途径的差异丰度，包括血清素和多巴胺的生物合成途径。我们没有发现与症状和应激相关的生物标志物和 CCs 之间存在稳健关联的证据。
我们的研究结果进一步证明了妊娠期间产前心理困扰如何改变母婴微生物组生态系统，这对于理解母婴健康结局可能很重要。
