Biochemistry, Biophysics, and Structural Biology Commons^™

Computational Modeling Of The Gut Microbiota Reveals Putative Metabolic Mechanisms Of Recurrent Clostridioides Difficile Infection, Michael A. Henson

Chemical Engineering Faculty Publication Series

Author summary Clostridioides difficile is an opportunistic human pathogen responsible for acute and sometimes chronic infections of the colon. Elderly individuals who are immunocompromised, frequently hospitalized and antibiotic recipients are particular susceptible to C. difficile infection (CDI). Approximately 30% of CDI patients will suffer at least one episode of reinfection, commonly termed recurrence. The objective of the current study was to utilize computational metabolic modeling to investigate the hypothesis that recurrent infections are related to the composition of the gut bacterial community within each patient. Our modeling results suggest that patients who have high abundances of the bacterial family Enterobacteriaceae …