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REVIEW article

Front. Pharmacol.
Sec. Respiratory Pharmacology
Volume 15 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/fphar.2024.1497173
This article is part of the Research Topic Lung Microbiome in Health and Disease View all 3 articles

Bacteria And Fungi Of The Lung: Allies Or Enemies?

Provisionally accepted
  • 1 San Raffaele Hospital (IRCCS), Milan, Lombardy, Italy
  • 2 Department of Medicine and Surgery, University of Perugia, Perugia, Umbria, Italy
  • 3 IRCCS San Raffaele Roma srl, Roma, Italy
  • 4 IRCCS San Raffaele Roma, Rome, Italy, University of Perugia, Perugia, Perugia, Italy

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Moving from the earlier periods in which the lungs were believed to represent sterile environments, our knowledge on the lung microbiota has dramatically increased, from the first descriptions of the microbial communities inhabiting the healthy lungs and the definition of the ecological rules that regulate its composition, to the identification of the changes that occur in pathological conditions. Despite the limitations of lung as a microbiome reservoir due to the low microbial biomass and abundance, defining its microbial composition and function in the upper and lower airways may help understanding the impact on local homeostasis and its disruption in lung diseases. In particular, the understanding of the metabolic and immune significance of microbes, their presence or lack thereof, in health and disease states could be valuable in development of novel druggable targets in disease treatments. Next-generation sequencing has identified intricate intermicrobe association networks that comprise true mutualistic or antagonistic direct or indirect relationships in the respiratory tract. In this review, the tripartite interaction of bacteria, fungi and the mammalian host is addressed to provide an integrated view of the microbial-host cross-talk in lung health and diseases from an immune and metabolic perspective.

    Keywords: Respiratory bacteriome, respiratory mycobiome, bacterial-fungal interactions, Immunity, Metabolism

    Received: 16 Sep 2024; Accepted: 28 Oct 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Garaci, Pariano, Nunzi, Costantini, Bellet, Antognelli, Russo and Romani. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Luigina Romani, IRCCS San Raffaele Roma, Rome, Italy, University of Perugia, Perugia, 06123, Perugia, Italy

    Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.