ReviewPhilosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences2015
The role of the local microbial ecosystem in respiratory health and disease.
Review in Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences, 2015. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 152 papers, 6 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
152 citing papers in PubMed, 6 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.
- Flavonoids in Nasal Therapeutics: Biological Activities, Delivery Challenges, and Formulation Strategies-A Systematic Review.Phytotherapy research : PTR · 2026Pooled it
- Meta-analysis of the human upper respiratory tract microbiome reveals robust taxonomic associations with health and disease.BMC biology · 2024Pooled it
- Antibiotic treatment to prevent pediatric acute otitis media infectious complications: A meta-analysis.PloS one · 2024Pooled it
- Exploring the microbial landscape of the nasopharynx in children: a systematic review of studies using next generation sequencing.Frontiers in microbiomes · 2023Pooled it
- Increased risk of pneumonia amongst residents living near goat farms in different livestock-dense regions in the Netherlands.PloS one · 2023Pooled it
- The association between bacteria colonizing the upper respiratory tract and lower respiratory tract infection in young children: a systematic review and meta-analysis.Clinical microbiology and infection : the official publication of the European Society of Clinical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases · 2021Pooled it
- Changes in the pharyngeal and nasal microbiota in pediatric patients with adenotonsillar hypertrophy.Microbiology spectrum · 2024Trial
- Trial
- A bacterial pangenome association study identifies a role for polyamine metabolism and alkaline tolerance in middle ear infections.PLoS pathogens · 2026Article
- Nasopharyngeal microbiota profiles and lytA-PCR status in adult pneumococcal pneumonia: distinct microbial communities and diagnostic implications.Pneumonia (Nathan Qld.) · 2026Article
- Nasopharyngeal Microbiome Differences Between Children with Hypertrophic Adenoids and Healthy Controls.Biology · 2026Article
- Vancomycin Protects Against Lung Injury and Promotes Butyrate Metabolism.FASEB journal : official publication of the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology · 2026Article
- Dual-transcriptomic analysis of human nasal transcriptome and microbiome reveals host-bacteria associations in symptomatic respiratory infection.BMC genomics · 2026Article
- Factors influencing preterm infant microbiota and their role in wheezing development.Pediatric research · 2026Article
- Pathogen-specific immune responses might underlie divergent outcomes of coronavirus and influenza infection in the natural porcine host.Communications biology · 2026Article
- Shotgun metagenomic profiling of bacterial microbiomes, metagenome-assembled genomes and antimicrobial resistance in respiratory and blood samples from Gambian children with pneumonia.Research square · 2026Article
- Atopic Features and Inflammatory Markers Across Cassano-Graded Adenoid Hypertrophy.Children (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Article
- Longitudinal Changes in Nasal and Oral Microbiome and Antimicrobial Resistance Gene Profiles in Response to Human Fecal Microbiota Transplantation.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2026Article
- Bacterial pharyngitis, antimicrobial susceptibility, and associated factors among children at comprehensive specialized hospitals, Northwest Ethiopia.BMC infectious diseases · 2026Article
- Efficacy of Adding Intravenous Methylprednisolone to Nebulized Budesonide in RSV Pneumonia: Modification by Bacterial Co-Infection - A Retrospective Cohort Study.Pediatric health, medicine and therapeutics · 2026Article
92 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
3 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Respiratory tract infections are a major global health concern, accounting for high morbidity and mortality, especially in young children and elderly individuals. Traditionally, highly common bacterial respiratory tract infections, including otitis media and pneumonia, were thought to be caused by a limited number of pathogens including Streptococcus pneumoniae and Haemophilus influenzae. However, these pathogens are also frequently observed commensal residents of the upper respiratory tract (URT) and form-together with harmless commensal bacteria, viruses and fungi-intricate ecological networks, collectively known as the 'microbiome'. Analogous to the gut microbiome, the respiratory microbiome at equilibrium is thought to be beneficial to the host by priming the immune system and providing colonization resistance, while an imbalanced ecosystem might predispose to bacterial overgrowth and development of respiratory infections. We postulate that specific ecological perturbations of the bacterial communities in the URT can occur in response to various lifestyle or environmental effectors, leading to diminished colonization resistance, loss of containment of newly acquired or resident pathogens, preluding bacterial overgrowth, ultimately resulting in local or systemic bacterial infections. Here, we review the current body of literature regarding niche-specific upper respiratory microbiota profiles within human hosts and the changes occurring within these profiles that are associated with respiratory infections.
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Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.