Local oral and nasal microbiome diversity in age-related macular degenerationOriginal paper
Karen Pendergrass is a microbiome researcher specializing in microbiome-targeted interventions (MBTIs). She systematically analyzes scientific literature to identify microbial patterns, develop hypotheses, and validate interventions. As the founder of the Microbiome Signatures Database, she bridges microbiome research with clinical practice. In 2012, based on her own investigative research, she became the first documented case of FMT for Celiac Disease, four years before the first published case study.
Read MoreWhat was studied?
Researchers compared nasal and oral microbiota composition between newly diagnosed neovascular age related macular degeneration cases and controls without retinal disease. The case control study included 13 AMD patients (6 male, 7 female) and 5 controls (2 male, 3 female).
How was it studied?
Investigators performed 16S rRNA gene sequencing of the V4 region using universal primers 515F to 806R on oral and nasal samples. Beta diversity was assessed with Principal Coordinates Analysis of the Bray Curtis index in QIIME 2.
What did they find?
Oral and nasal microbial communities separated clearly by beta diversity (p < 0.001), and composition differed between AMD cases and controls in both sites. In oral samples Burkholderiales, Actinomyceataceae, and Gemella showed the largest increases versus controls. In nasal samples Rothia, Actinobacteria, and Propionibacteriales showed the largest increases, with Rothia rising 13.6 log2fold (p = 3.63E-18).
Why it matters
These relative shifts in mucosal bacterial communities in newly diagnosed neovascular AMD patients may point to additional mechanistic links in disease pathogenesis.