Ragweed pollen exposure doesn't disrupt nasal bacteria, study finds
Linton S, Sjaarda C, Hossenbaccus L, Davis A, Greenlaw J
Plant Signaling
That ragweed patch you've been meaning to pull from the yard's edge is a seasonal trigger for millions, and this study shows the sneezing and congestion it causes isn't from pollen wrecking your nasal bacteria the way antibiotics might.
Researchers sprayed ragweed pollen extract into the noses of allergic and non-allergic volunteers to see if it would shake up the community of bacteria living in their nasal passages. Surprisingly, the bacterial makeup stayed pretty much the same before and after exposure, even though the allergic participants had classic allergy symptoms. What did change the bacterial mix were things like a person's sex, whether they carried Staph bacteria, and how much allergy antibody they had circulating.
Key Findings
19 ragweed-allergic and 12 non-allergic participants underwent nasal allergen challenge with secretions sampled at baseline, 6, 24, and 48 hours
Allergic status and pollen exposure had no significant effect on microbial alpha or beta diversity over time
Higher ragweed-specific IgE levels correlated with increased Streptococcus, Rothia, Staphylococcus, Neisseria, and Delftia abundance (P = .001)
chevron_right Technical Summary
Scientists tested whether exposing people with ragweed allergies to ragweed pollen would disrupt the bacteria living in their nose. It didn't: the nasal microbiome stayed stable regardless of allergy status, though factors like sex, IgE antibody levels, and Staph bacteria carriage did shape which microbes were present.
Abstract Preview
Original paper
Characterizing the nasal microbiome using a nasal allergen challenge model.
The role of the nasal microbiome in allergic rhinitis (AR), particularly following direct allergen exposure using a controlled model, is incompletely understood. Understanding microbiome dynamics a...
open_in_new Read full abstractAbstract copyright held by the original publisher.
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Ragweeds are flowering plants in the genus Ambrosia in the aster family, Asteraceae. They are distributed in the tropical and subtropical regions of the Americas, especially North America, where the origin and center of diversity of the genus are in the southwestern United States and northwestern...