Potential of Prebiotic D-tagatose for Prevention of Oral Disease. Streptococcus

D-tagatose is expected to be applied in various contexts, such as diabetes management, pesticides, and prebiotics for the intestines. Additionally, D-tagatose has been reported to inhibit the growth of S. mutans (Hasibul et al., 2018) (Sawada et al., 2015), though there are few studies regarding its effects on other types of oral bacteria. Furthermore, no known reports of comprehensive analyses of tagatose-induced dynamic changes in oral bacteria using transcriptomics have been presented. In the present study, results of in vitro examinations of the effects of D-tagatose on transcriptomic profiles of the oral streptococci S. mutans, S. gordonii, and S. oralis highlight its potential use as an oral prebiotic for altering the gene expression of those oral streptococci.