ArticleScientific reports2018
Quantitation of the cellular content of saliva and buccal swab samples.
Article in Scientific reports, 2018. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 162 papers, 3 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
162 citing papers in PubMed, 3 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 274 citations in OpenAlex.
- New insights into the (epi)genetics of twinning.Human reproduction (Oxford, England) · 2024Pooled it
- Telomere length analysis from minimally-invasively collected samples: Methods development and meta-analysis of the validity of different sampling techniques: American Journal of Human Biology.American journal of human biology : the official journal of the Human Biology Council · 2021Pooled it
- A cell-type deconvolution meta-analysis of whole blood EWAS reveals lineage-specific smoking-associated DNA methylation changes.Nature communications · 2020Pooled it
- Telehealth Parenting Program and Salivary Epigenetic Biomarkers in Preschool Children With Developmental Delay: NIMHD Social Epigenomics Program.JAMA network open · 2024Trial
- Differential profiles of soluble and cellular toll like receptor (TLR)-2 and 4 in chronic periodontitis.PloS one · 2018Trial
- Differential DNA methylation clock ages across buffy coat (BC), peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMC), and saliva in individuals in early-to-mid adulthood.Epigenetics · 2026Article
- Development of a precise saliva-based epigenetic clock using a six-CpG-marker panel.International journal of legal medicine · 2026Article
- Noninvasive malaria detection beyond blood sampling.Sensors & diagnostics · 2026Review
- Mechanistic Characterization of Biologically Inspired Oral Neutrophil Isolation for AI-Assisted Oral Inflammatory Load Assessment.Biomimetics (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Article
- DNA methylation changes following rapid maxillary expansion in children.Scientific reports · 2026Article
- Review
- Pre-sampling conditions affect salivary genomic DNA yield and human DNA fraction: a single-donor pilot study.Genomics & informatics · 2026Article
- Machine learning-based analysis of oral rinse samples to identify candidate proteomic signatures for severe periodontitis: a pilot study.Scientific reports · 2026Article
- Longitudinal Salivary Immunophenotyping Reveals Distinct Cellular Signatures of Periodontal Disease Activity and Resolution.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2026Article
- Low-level mosaic variants causing the pancreatic disease congenital hyperinsulinism can be detected from blood DNA.EBioMedicine · 2026Article
- Probing buccal-customized epigenetic clocks to investigate socioeconomic and health disparities.GeroScience · 2026Article
- Deep learning and object detection methods for scoring cell types within the human buccal cell micronucleus and cytome assays for human biomonitoring.Mutagenesis · 2026Review
- Not all saliva samples are equal: The role of cellular heterogeneity in DNA methylation and epigenetic age analyses with biological and psychosocial factors.Psychoneuroendocrinology · 2026Article
- Parental behavior, adult attachment, and DNA methylation of the MT2 oxytocin receptor gene region - The moderating role of neuroticism.PloS one · 2026Article
- Analysis of HLA genotype in the recipients' different tissues after haploidentical hematopoietic stem cell transplantation.Frontiers in immunology · 2026Article
102 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
6 authors at 4 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Buccal swabs and saliva are the two most common oral sampling methods used for medical research. Often, these samples are used interchangeably, despite previous evidence that both contain buccal cells and blood leukocytes in different proportions. For some research, such as epigenetic studies, the cell types contributing to the analysis are highly relevant. We collected such samples from twelve children and twenty adults and, using Papanicolaou staining, measured the proportions of epithelial cells and leukocytes through microscopy. To our knowledge, no studies have compared cellular heterogeneity in buccal swab and saliva samples from adults and children. We confirmed that buccal swabs contained a higher proportion of epithelial cells than saliva and that children have a greater proportion of such cells in saliva compared to adults. At this level of resolution, buccal swabs and saliva contained similar epithelial cell subtypes. Gingivitis in children was associated with a higher proportion of leukocytes in saliva samples but not in buccal swabs. Compared to more detailed and costly methods such as flow cytometry or deconvolution methods used in epigenomic analysis, the procedure described here can serve as a simple and low-cost method to characterize buccal and saliva samples. Microscopy provides a low-cost tool to alert researchers to the presence of oral inflammation which may affect a subset of their samples. This knowledge might be highly relevant to their specific research questions, may assist with sample selection and thus might be crucial information despite the ability of data deconvolution methods to correct for cellular heterogeneity.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
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.