Dataset Information

Topographic diversity of fungal and bacterial communities in human skin.

ABSTRACT: Traditional culture-based methods have incompletely defined the microbial landscape of common recalcitrant human fungal skin diseases, including athlete's foot and toenail infections. Skin protects humans from invasion by pathogenic microorganisms and provides a home for diverse commensal microbiota. Bacterial genomic sequence data have generated novel hypotheses about species and community structures underlying human disorders. However, microbial diversity is not limited to bacteria; microorganisms such as fungi also have major roles in microbial community stability, human health and disease. Genomic methodologies to identify fungal species and communities have been limited compared with those that are available for bacteria. Fungal evolution can be reconstructed with phylogenetic markers, including ribosomal RNA gene regions and other highly conserved genes. Here we sequenced and analysed fungal communities of 14?skin sites in 10?healthy adults. Eleven core-body and arm sites were dominated by fungi of the genus Malassezia, with only species-level classifications revealing fungal-community composition differences between sites. By contrast, three foot sites--plantar heel, toenail and toe web--showed high fungal diversity. Concurrent analysis of bacterial and fungal communities demonstrated that physiologic attributes and topography of skin differentially shape these two microbial communities. These results provide a framework for future investigation of the contribution of interactions between pathogenic and commensal fungal and bacterial communities to the maintainenace of human health and to disease pathogenesis.

SUBMITTER: Findley K

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3711185 | biostudies-literature | 2013 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

ACCESS DATA

Publications

Topographic diversity of fungal and bacterial communities in human skin.

Findley Keisha K Oh Julia J Yang Joy J Conlan Sean S Deming Clayton C Meyer Jennifer A JA Schoenfeld Deborah D Nomicos Effie E Park Morgan M Kong Heidi H HH Segre Julia A JA

Nature 20130522 7454

Traditional culture-based methods have incompletely defined the microbial landscape of common recalcitrant human fungal skin diseases, including athlete's foot and toenail infections. Skin protects humans from invasion by pathogenic microorganisms and provides a home for diverse commensal microbiota. Bacterial genomic sequence data have generated novel hypotheses about species and community structures underlying human disorders. However, microbial diversity is not limited to bacteria; microorgan ...[more]

PMID: 23698366

Similar Datasets

Project description:Psoriasis is a chronic inflammatory skin disease, whose pathogenesis involves dysregulated interplay among immune cells, keratinocytes and environmental triggers, including microbiota. Bacterial and fungal dysbiosis has been recently associated with several chronic immune-mediated diseases including psoriasis. In this comprehensive study, we investigated how different sampling sites and methods reflect the uncovered skin microbiota composition. After establishing the most suitable approach, we further examined correlations between bacteria and fungi on the psoriatic skin. We compared microbiota composition determined in the same sample by sequencing two distinct hypervariable regions of the 16S rRNA gene. We showed that using the V3V4 region led to higher species richness and evenness than using the V1V2 region. In particular, genera, such as Staphylococcus and Micrococcus were more abundant when using the V3V4 region, while Planococcaceae, on the other hand, were detected only by the V1V2 region. We performed a detailed analysis of skin microbiota composition of psoriatic lesions, unaffected psoriatic skin, and healthy control skin from the back and elbow. Only a few discriminative features were uncovered, mostly specific for the sampling site or method (swab, scraping, or biopsy). Swabs from psoriatic lesions on the back and the elbow were associated with increased abundance of Brevibacterium and Kocuria palustris and Gordonia, respectively. In the same samples from psoriatic lesions, we found a significantly higher abundance of the fungus Malassezia restricta on the back, while Malassezia sympodialis dominated the elbow mycobiota. In psoriatic elbow skin, we found significant correlation between occurrence of Kocuria, Lactobacillus, and Streptococcus with Saccharomyces, which was not observed in healthy skin. For the first time, we showed here a psoriasis-specific correlation between fungal and bacterial species, suggesting a link between competition for niche occupancy and psoriasis. However, it still remains to be elucidated whether observed microbial shift and specific inter-kingdom relationship pattern are of primary etiological significance or secondary to the disease.

Project description:BackgroundSkin microbiome varies from person to person due to a combination of various factors, including age, biogeography, sex, cosmetics and genetics. Many skin disorders appear to be related to the resident microflora, yet databases of facial skin microbiome of many biogeographies, including Thai, are limited.MethodsMetagenomics derived B-RISA and 16S rRNA gene sequencing was utilized to identify the culture-independent bacterial diversity on Thai male faces (cheek and forehead areas). Skin samples were categorized (grouped) into (i) normal (teenage.hea) and (ii) acne-prone (teenage.acn) young adults, and normal (iii) middle-aged (middle.hea) and (iv) elderly (elderly.hea) adults.ResultsThe 16S rRNA gene sequencing was successful as the sequencing depth had an estimated >98% genus coverage of the true community. The major diversity was found between the young and elderly adults in both cheek and forehead areas, followed by that between normal and acne young adults. Detection of representative characteristics indicated that bacteria from the order Rhizobiales, genera Sphingomonas and Pseudoalteromonas, distinguished the elderly.hea microbiota, along the clinical features of wrinkles and pores. Prediction of the metabolic potential revealed reduced metabolic pathways involved in replication and repair, nucleotide metabolism and genetic translation in the elderly.hea compared with that in the teenage.hea. For young adults, some unique compositions such as abundance of Propionibacterium acnes and Staphylococcus epidermidis, with a minor diversity between normal and acne skins, were detected. The metabolic potentials of the acne vs. normal young adults showed that teenage.acn was low in many cellular processes (e.g., cell motility and environmental adaptation), but high in carbohydrate metabolism, which could support acne growth. Moreover, comparison with the age-matched males from the US (Boulder, Colorado) to gain insight into the diversity across national biogeography, revealed differences in the distribution pattern of species, although common bacteria were present in both biogeographical samples. Furthermore, B-RISA served as a crosscheck result to the 16S rRNA gene sequencing (i.e., differences between teenage and elderly microbiota).ConclusionsThis study revealed and compared the microbial diversity on different aged Thai male faces, and included analyses for representing the bacterial flora, the clinical skin characteristics, and comparison with the US age-matched. The results represent the first skin microbiota of Thai males, and helps the design of a large-scale skin microbiome study of Thais. The findings of the diversity among ages, skin type and national biogeography supported the importance of these traits in the skin microbiome and in developing a safe and sustainable treatment for acne and aging skin diseases.

Dataset Information

Topographic diversity of fungal and bacterial communities in human skin.

Publications

Topographic diversity of fungal and bacterial communities in human skin.

Similar Datasets

OmicsDI is part of the ELIXIR infrastructure

Tweets