Characterisation of potentially probiotic vaginal lactobacilli isolated from Argentinean women.

MARÍA SILVINA JUÁREZ TOMÁS; DANIELA ZONENSCHAIN; LORENZO MORELLI; MARÍA ELENA NADER-MACÍAS

BRITISH JOURNAL OF BIOMEDICAL SCIENCE

STEP PUBLISHING LTD

Lugar: London; Año: 2005 vol. 62 p. 1 - 5

0967-4845

In order to evaluate potentially beneficial properties of twenty vaginal Lactobacillus strains isolated from women of Tucumán, Argentina, the acid and hydrogen peroxide production and the auto-aggregation ability were determined. The microorganisms were genetically characterized by applying the amplified ribosomal 16S-DNA restriction analysis (ARDRA). Lactobacillus gasseri and L. rhamnosus were the predominant species identified among the twenty vaginal Lactobacillus strains. Most of the Lactobacillus strains studied reached low pH values after 12 hours of incubation at 37°C and produced hydrogen peroxide in static cultures. However, the pH decrease and semi quantitative hydrogen peroxide production of most of the homofermentative lactobacilli was significantly higher than this of heterofermentative lactobacilli. On the other hand, only three strains presented a remarkable auto-aggregation pattern. Four Lactobacillus strains were selected to be potentially included in a probiotic product for vaginal application. Therefore, further in vitro studies of different potentially probiotic characteristics must be rigorously performed before attempting expensive clinical trials.