Dual transcriptome of Streptococcus mutans and Candida albicans interplay in biofilms

Jin Xiao; Yan Zeng; Elena Rustchenko; Xinyan Huang; Tong Tong Wu; Megan L Falsetta

doi:10.1080/20002297.2022.2144047

Dual transcriptome of Streptococcus mutans and Candida albicans interplay in biofilms

J Oral Microbiol. 2022 Nov 9;15(1):2144047. doi: 10.1080/20002297.2022.2144047. eCollection 2023.

Authors

Jin Xiao¹, Yan Zeng¹, Elena Rustchenko², Xinyan Huang¹, Tong Tong Wu³, Megan L Falsetta⁴

Affiliations

¹ Eastman Institute for Oral Health, University of Rochester Medical Center, Rochester, NY, USA.
² Department of Biochemistry and Biophysics, University of Rochester Medical Center, Rochester, NY, USA.
³ Department of Biostatistics and Computational Biology, University of Rochester Medical Center, Rochester, NY, USA.
⁴ Departments of Obstetrics and Gynecology and Pharmacology and Physiology, University of Rochester Medical Center, Rochester, NY, USA.

Abstract

Objective: To assess the interactions between Streptococcus mutans and Candida albicans during cariogenic biofilm formation.

Methods: The S. mutans and C. albicans duo-species biofilms were formed in 1% sucrose to mimic the high caries risk challenges. The biofilm structure was assessed using two-photon laser confocal microscopy. The transcriptome of 48h-biofilms was assessed by RNA-Seq. The expression of S. mutans and C. albicans virulence genes was examined via real-time reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction.

Results: The morphogenesis of C. albicans-S. mutans duo-species biofilms was significantly altered when comparing to S. mutans or C. albicans single-species biofilm. Duo-species biofilms exhibited unique expression profile with a large number of differentially expressed genes (DEGs), including a higher expression of S. mutans atpD (acid-adaptive), C. albicans CHT2 (fungal cell wall chitin remodeling), and C. albicans SOD3 (cytotoxic oxygen radical destroying) (p < 0.05). KEGG pathway analyses further revealed that the majority of the up-regulated DEGs are related to microbial metabolism. Furthermore, the expressions of S. mutans and C. albicans key virulence genes (gtfB, gtfC, gtfD, ECE1, HWP1, ERG4, CHT2) were associated with sugar availability-related and time-related dynamics.

Conclusion: Cross-kingdom interactions impact S. mutans-C. albicans biofilm formations and dynamic expressions of virulence genes.

Keywords: Biofilms; candida albicans; dental caries; oral infection; streptococcus mutans; transcriptome.

Abstract

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