breakdown of tooth-supporting tissues, producing dentition loss. Porphyromonas gingivalis (P. gingivalis), a Gramnegative anaerobic rod, is one of the major pathogens associated with periodontitis. Neutrophils are first line defense cells in the oral cavity that play a significant role in inflammatory response. Xylitol is a known anti-caries agent and has anti-inflammatory effects. In this study, we conducted experiments to evaluate anti-inflammatory effects of xylitol on P. gingivalis infected neutrophils for possible usage in prevention and treatment of periodontal infections. P. gingivalis was intraperitoneally injected and peritoneal lavage was collected for cytokine determination. For in vitro study, neutrophils were collected from mouse peritoneal cells after zymosan injection or bone marrow cells. Neutrophils were stimulated with live P. gingivalis and ELISA was used to determine the effect of xylitol on P. gingivalis induced cytokine production. IL-1β, IL-6, TNF-α concentration and neutrophil population in the peritoneal lavage was increased in P. gingivalis-infected mouse. Peritoneal cells infected with live P. gingivalis revealed significantly increased production of IL-1β, IL-6 and TNF-α at multiplicity of infection of 10. Neutrophils from bone marrow and peritoneal lavage revealed increased production of IL-1β, IL-6 and TNF-α. Xylitol significantly mitigated P. gingivalis induced cytokine production in neutrophils. Findings indicate that xylitol is an anti-inflammatory agent in neutrophils infected with live P. gingivalis, that suggests its use in periodontitis management.

Introduction
 Materials and Methods
  Bacterial culture
  Animal study
  Flow cytometry analysis
  Neutrophil isolation and Cell treatment
  Cytokine analysis
  Statistics
 Results
  P. gingivalis induces recruitment of neutrophils andinduces inflammatory cytokine production.
  P. gingivalis-induces cytokine production in neutrophilsisolated from bone marrow and peritoneal cavity.
  Xylitol mitigates P. gingivalis-induced cytokineproduction in neutrophils isolated from bone marrow.
 Discussion
 References

• Hee Sam Na(Department of Oral Microbiology, School of Dentistry, Pusan National University)
• YuRi Song(Department of Oral Microbiology, School of Dentistry, Pusan National University)
• Yoon Hee Choi(Department of Hematology-Oncology, Dongnam Institute of Radiological and Medical Sciences)
• Jin Chung(Department of Oral Microbiology, School of Dentistry, Pusan National University) Correspondence to