. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2017 Jun 1.

Published in final edited form as: Trends Microbiol. 2016 Mar 8;24(6):477–489. doi: 10.1016/j.tim.2016.02.010

Table 1.

Examples of Interbacterial Interactions in Polymicrobial Community Diseases

Disease	Interacting organisms^a	Mechanism of interaction and outcome	Refs
Wound Infections	Staphylococcus aureus – Pseudomonas aeruginosa	In dual species biofilms expression of staphylococcal Panton-Valentine toxin and α-hemolysin is increased. P. aeruginosa responds to staphylococcal peptidoglycan by elevated production of quinolone signal (PQS) controlled virulence factors.	[71, 72]
Cystic fibrosis	P. aeruginosa - Burkholderia cenocepacia and Stenotrophomonas maltophilia	Diffusible signal factor (DSF) family molecules (cis-2-unsaturated fatty acids) produced by B. cenocepacia and S. maltophilia increase P. aeruginosa persistence and antibiotic resistance.	[73]
Otitis media	Haemophilus influenzae - Moraxella catarrhalis	AI-2 produced by H. influenzae increases mixed biofilm development and antibiotic resistance in M. catarrhalis.	[17]
Gastrointestinal infections	Bacteroides. thetaiotaomicron - EHEC	B. thetaiotaomicron produces fucosidases that generate fucose from host-derived glycans. Fucose increases EHEC virulence gene expression by activating FusKR. Short chain fatty acids and succinate produced by Bacteroides also increase virulence gene expression in EHEC.	[32, 34, 35]
Oropharyngeal candidiasis	Candida albicans – Streptococcus oralis and S. gordonii	Streptococcal AI-2, peptidoglycan and peroxide can increase Candida filamentation and dissemination.	[6, 74]
Localized aggressive periodontitis	Aggregatibacter actinomycetemcomitans – S. gordonii	A. actinomycetemcomitans preferentially utilizes lactate produced by S. gordonii, and peroxide generated by S. gordonii increases expression of virulence genes in A. actinomycetemcomitans.	[15, 28]
Chronic periodontitis	Porphyromonas gingivalis – S. gordonii	Co-adhesion initiates tyrosine (de) phosphorylation dependent signaling pathway in P. gingivalis that enhances dual species biofilm development.	[3, 4]

Examples of organisms for which interspecies communication has been defined. These polymicrobial infections can involve several other species and additional synergistic interactions.