TY - CHAP
T1 - Methods to Study Antagonistic Activities Among Oral Bacteria
AU - Qi, Fengxia
AU - Kreth, Jens
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2023, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature.
PY - 2023
Y1 - 2023
N2 - Most bacteria in nature exist in multispecies communities known as biofilms. In the natural habitat where resources (nutrient, space, etc.) are usually limited, individual species must compete or collaborate with other neighboring species in order to perpetuate in the multispecies community. The human oral cavity is colonized by >700 microbial species known as the indigenous microbiota. This indigenous flora normally maintains an ecological balance through antagonistic as well as mutualistic interspecies interactions. However, environmental perturbation may disrupt this balance, leading to overgrowth of pathogenic species which could in turn initiate diseases such as dental caries (tooth decay) and periodontitis (gum disease). Understanding the mechanisms of diversity maintenance may help developing novel approaches to manage these “polymicrobial diseases”. In this chapter, we will focus on a well-characterized form of biochemical warfare: bacteriocins produced by Streptococcus mutans, a primary dental caries pathogen, and hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) produced by several oral commensal streptococci. We will describe detailed methodologies on the competition assay, isolation, purification, and characterization of bacteriocins.
AB - Most bacteria in nature exist in multispecies communities known as biofilms. In the natural habitat where resources (nutrient, space, etc.) are usually limited, individual species must compete or collaborate with other neighboring species in order to perpetuate in the multispecies community. The human oral cavity is colonized by >700 microbial species known as the indigenous microbiota. This indigenous flora normally maintains an ecological balance through antagonistic as well as mutualistic interspecies interactions. However, environmental perturbation may disrupt this balance, leading to overgrowth of pathogenic species which could in turn initiate diseases such as dental caries (tooth decay) and periodontitis (gum disease). Understanding the mechanisms of diversity maintenance may help developing novel approaches to manage these “polymicrobial diseases”. In this chapter, we will focus on a well-characterized form of biochemical warfare: bacteriocins produced by Streptococcus mutans, a primary dental caries pathogen, and hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) produced by several oral commensal streptococci. We will describe detailed methodologies on the competition assay, isolation, purification, and characterization of bacteriocins.
KW - Bacteriocins
KW - Biofilms
KW - Hydrogen peroxide (HO)
KW - Interspecies competition
KW - Luciferase reporter
KW - Oral streptococci
KW - Streptococcus mutans
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U2 - 10.1007/978-1-0716-2780-8_11
DO - 10.1007/978-1-0716-2780-8_11
M3 - Chapter
C2 - 36418688
AN - SCOPUS:85142686521
T3 - Methods in Molecular Biology
SP - 171
EP - 186
BT - Methods in Molecular Biology
PB - Humana Press Inc.
ER -