Emily F. Wissel, Robert A. Petit III, Timothy D. Read , Anne L. Dunlop
School of Nursing, Emory University & Division of Infectious Diseases, School of Medicine, Emory University 

Please note that these are preliminary results. We are currently conducting an analysis to see if the clinical trends in this analysis hold true in our entire sample.

If you have any questions, comments, or suggestions, feel free to tweet me / DM me at @emily_wissel

 
Background. The vaginal microbiome can serve as a protective and risk factor in health outcomes. Most research to date has focused on the bacterial members of the microbiome, though the virome has been implicated in health outcomes such as preterm birth. This study aimed to characterize the vaginal virome of pregnant women who self-identified as African American, as they experience the greatest risk for negative health outcomes associated with the microbiome.
  
Methods. Data was collected from 485 women (preliminary data: n= 20) during the first and third trimester of singleton pregnancy. Ten of the 70 samples had sufficient viral DNA to be included in analysis (abundance > 3%). For our preliminary analysis, sequences were filtered, processed, and analyzed on the OneCodex platform. For the full analysis, we plan to utilize the biobakery workflow and other tools discussed at this conference.

Results. Similar to past research, we found human herpes simplex virus (HSV) to be the most abundant, with gamma herpesvirus 4 being the most common form of HSV. Human Papilloma Virus (HPV) was also highly abundant in our preliminary analysis. Phages of Lactobacillus and Streptococcus were the next most abundant viruses in our preliminary analysis. It appears that the composition of the bacterial microbiome changes over the course of the pregnancy, but it is unclear if this shift is clinically important. We found that women with HSV, HPV, or HIV  were less likely to harbor Lactobacillus, though it is unclear exactly what is driving this association.

Conclusion: It is commonly thought that women who harbor Lactobacillus species in their vaginal microbiome have the lowest risk for negative health outcomes. We found that women whose vaginal microbiome contained higher abundances of clinically relevant viruses (HSV, HPV, and HIV) were less likely to have Lactobacillus in their vaginal community. While our preliminary analysis does not address the virome in preterm birth, our final analysis of 485 women will explore this. These findings indicate that the vaginal virome is important to consider when examining maternal health and complications.