Dental caries can be defined as a biofilm-mediated disease caused by the production of acids due to carbohydrate fermentation by bacteria in the oral cavity. Fermentation of carbohydrates in the oral cavity causes a shift in microbiota, increasing the proportion of aciduric bacteria that can express high acid tolerance patterns. Previous studies have shown that mutans streptococci have the highest aciduric capacities and are the main bacterial species associated with tooth decay (dental caries); however, sparse literature has demonstrated the potential inhibitive effects of S. oligofermentans against mutans streptococci. Here, we tested if S. oligofermentans has a potential antimicrobial effect against these cariogenic species in biofilms. In a discovery-validation pipeline involving in vitro approaches in cariogenic challenging conditions, we tested the ability of S. oligofermentans to inhibit the cariogenic properties of mutans streptococci. We show that S. oligofermentans demonstrated inhibitive properties against mutans streptococci through the production of hydrogen peroxide in biofilms. Using S. oligofermentans supernatant, it was confirmed that it could inhibit mutans streptococci in environments similar to the oral microbiome. Our work demonstrates that S. oligofermentans might represent a contemporary therapeutic treatment strategy to target cariogenic microbiota to limit the establishment of dental caries.
Ashley Lowder (Sun,) studied this question.