Genotyping of streptococcus mutans strains found in patient teeth and identification of IL-10 gene SNP associated with dental caries

The aim of this study was to microscopically evaluate caries-associated diseases caused by Streptococcus mutans, genotyping of bacterial strains, detection of polymorphisms in the interleukin-10 gene and determination of its association with dental caries. For this purpose, samples were taken from 50 people with severe dental caries and 50 healthy people from different hospitals between December 2021 and June 2022. Mitis salivarius agar, a selective medium, was used for Streptococcus mutans isolated from the samples. BioEdit-based genotyping of the dexA gene sequence was performed in nine strains of S. mutans. Suh. Weh. 1-9 were randomly selected and sequence variation was determined in all nine isolates. Multiple alignment based on BioEdit identified 5 genotypes in S. mutans and multiple alignment based on Geneious prime software identified 9 genotypes. Phylogenetic trees were constructed online and then using the MEGA 6 program. The primers to be used in the molecular studies were created specifically for S. mutans. The immunogenetic study revealed that the primer pair next to the promoter of the IL-10 gene successfully amplified the target under amplification. Innate identification of microbes is the first line of defense against infection and IL-10 plays an important role in this process. Activating antimicrobial immunity, multiple immune-related disorders have been associated with IL-10 coding variants, highlighting the physiological importance of IL 10 signaling in immunity. In this research, a mutation in the IL-10 allele known to confer a strong antimicrobial defense was used.