Park Ju-Hyeong, Lemons Angela R, Croston Tara L, Roseman Jerry, Green Brett J, Cox-Ganser Jean M
National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, Respiratory Health Division, Morgantown, WV 26505, United States.
National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, Health Effects Laboratory Division, Morgantown, WV 26505, United States.
Build Environ. 2025 Mar;271. doi: 10.1016/j.buildenv.2025.112657.
Our understanding of how exposure to school microbiota affects the respiratory health of staff and students in schools is limited. We examined the associations between exposure to school microbiota and respiratory and gastrointestinal infections. We performed an epidemiologic analysis of 1,529 school employees in the U.S. A questionnaire was administered to school staff to collect health information, and floor dust was vacuumed from 500 classrooms in 50 schools. Fungal internal transcribed spacer region and bacterial 16S amplicon sequencing were performed with extracted genomic DNA using Illumina Mi-Seq platform. The resulting DNA sequences were clustered into operational taxonomic units (OTUs). Staff were assigned the school-building-specific floor average number of bacterial or fungal OTUs from the same floor as their exposure. We used logistic regression models to estimate adjusted odds ratios of reported respiratory and gastrointestinal infections in the last 12 months. Exposure to the highest quartile in number of OTUs (Q4, highest richness) of the bacterial phyla Firmicutes or Actinobacteria was associated with 28-61% lower odds of upper or lower respiratory infections compared to the lower three quartiles (Q123). Higher Firmicutes diversity was more strongly associated with upper respiratory infections, while greater Actinobacteria diversity showed a stronger association with lower respiratory infections. Fungal diversity was not associated with any type of infection, and neither bacterial nor fungal diversity was associated with gastrointestinal infections. Our study suggests that exposure to a highly diverse bacterial microbiota in school environments may play an important role in protecting school staff against respiratory infections.
我们对接触学校微生物群如何影响学校教职员工和学生的呼吸健康的了解有限。我们研究了接触学校微生物群与呼吸道和胃肠道感染之间的关联。我们对美国1529名学校员工进行了流行病学分析。向学校工作人员发放问卷以收集健康信息，并从50所学校的500间教室中采集地板灰尘。使用Illumina Mi-Seq平台对提取的基因组DNA进行真菌内转录间隔区和细菌16S扩增子测序。将得到的DNA序列聚类为操作分类单元（OTU）。根据工作人员所在楼层的特定学校建筑地板平均细菌或真菌OTU数量来确定其接触情况。我们使用逻辑回归模型来估计过去12个月报告的呼吸道和胃肠道感染的调整比值比。与较低的三个四分位数（Q123）相比，接触厚壁菌门或放线菌门OTU数量最高的四分位数（Q4，丰富度最高）与上呼吸道或下呼吸道感染的几率降低28-61%相关。较高的厚壁菌门多样性与上呼吸道感染的关联更强，而较高的放线菌门多样性与下呼吸道感染的关联更强。真菌多样性与任何类型的感染均无关联，细菌和真菌多样性与胃肠道感染也均无关联。我们的研究表明，在学校环境中接触高度多样化的细菌微生物群可能在保护学校工作人员免受呼吸道感染方面发挥重要作用。
