Diversity of human vaginal bacterial communities and associations with clinically defined bacterial vaginosis.

ABSTRACT: Bacterial vaginosis (BV) is a common syndrome associated with numerous adverse health outcomes in women. Despite its medical importance, the etiology and microbial ecology of BV remain poorly understood. We used broad-range PCR to census the community structure of the healthy and BV-affected vaginal microbial ecosystems and synthesized current publicly available bacterial 16S rRNA gene sequence data from this environment. The community of vaginal bacteria detected in subjects with BV was much more taxon rich and diverse than in subjects without BV. At a 97% sequence similarity cutoff, the number of operational taxonomic units (OTUs) per patient in 28 subjects with BV was nearly three times greater than in 13 subjects without BV: 14.8 +/- 0.7 versus 5.2 +/- 0.75 (mean +/- standard error). O

SUBMITTER: Oakley BB 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC2519371 | biostudies-literature | 2008 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature