Nature and Significance of Somatic Antigens of Oral Bacteria

¹ U.S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, Public Health Service, National Institutes of Health, National Institute of Dental Research, Immunology Section, Bethesda, Maryland

The somatic antigens or lipopolysaccharide endotoxins of gram-negative bacteria are a unique class of bacterial products that could have considerable significance in the host-parasite relationship in oral disease because of the array of physiological and immunological effects they have on the host. As the somatic type-specific antigen of human oral strains of gram-negative bacteria, they provide the oral microbiologist and epidemiologist with a serological marker that eventually may reveal that some serotypes of gram-negative bacteria or spirochetes are associated with the inflammatory phases of periodontal disease. Also, these lipopolysaccharides are potent antigens and the host's immune response to these antigens in the form of 19S M immunoglobulins, could be a factor in limiting the progression of oral disease.

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