This Article Full Text Full Text (PDF) Supplemental material Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted Services Similar articles in this journal Similar articles in PubMed Alert me to new issues of the journal Download to citation manager Reprints and Permissions Copyright Information Books from ASM Press MicrobeWorld Citing Articles Citing Articles via HighWire Google Scholar Articles by Antonopoulos, D. A. Articles by Young, V. B. PubMed PubMed Citation Articles by Antonopoulos, D. A. Articles by Young, V. B.

 Previous Article  |  Next Article 

Infection and Immunity, June 2009, p. 2367-2375, Vol. 77, No. 6
0019-9567/09/$08.00+0     doi:10.1128/IAI.01520-08
Copyright © 2009, American Society for Microbiology. All Rights Reserved.

Reproducible Community Dynamics of the Gastrointestinal Microbiota following Antibiotic Perturbation ^,

Dionysios A. Antonopoulos,¹ Susan M. Huse,³ Hilary G. Morrison,³ Thomas M. Schmidt,⁴ Mitchell L. Sogin,³ and Vincent B. Young^1,2*

Department of Internal Medicine, Division of Infectious Diseases,¹ Department of Microbiology and Immunology, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48109,² Marine Biological Laboratory, Woods Hole, Massachusetts, 02543,³ Department of Microbiology and Molecular Genetics, Michigan State University, East Lansing, Michigan 48824⁴

Received 15 December 2008/ Returned for modification 2 February 2009/ Accepted 12 March 2009

Shifts in microbial communities are implicated in the pathogenesis of a number of gastrointestinal diseases, but we have limited understanding of the mechanisms that lead to altered community structures. One difficulty with studying these mechanisms in human subjects is the inherent baseline variability of the microbiota in different individuals. In an effort to overcome this baseline variability, we employed a mouse model to control the host genotype, diet, and other possible influences on the microbiota. This allowed us to determine whether the indigenous microbiota in such mice had a stable baseline community structure and whether this community exhibited a consistent response following antibiotic administration. We employed a tag-sequencing strategy targeting the V6 hypervariable region of the bacterial small-subunit (16S) rRNA combined with massively parallel sequencing to determine the community structure of the gut microbiota. Inbred mice in a controlled environment harbored a reproducible baseline community that was significantly impacted by antibiotic administration. The ability of the gut microbial community to recover to baseline following the cessation of antibiotic administration differed according to the antibiotic regimen administered. Severe antibiotic pressure resulted in reproducible, long-lasting alterations in the gut microbial community, including a decrease in overall diversity. The finding of stereotypic responses of the indigenous microbiota to ecologic stress suggests that a better understanding of the factors that govern community structure could lead to strategies for the intentional manipulation of this ecosystem so as to preserve or restore a healthy microbiota.

---

* Corresponding author. Mailing address: The University of Michigan, 4618D Med. Sci. II SPC 5623, 1150 W. Medical Center Dr., Ann Arbor, MI 48109-5623. Phone: (734) 764-2237. Fax: (734) 763-4168. E-mail: youngvi{at}umich.edu

Published ahead of print on 23 March 2009.

Supplemental material for this article may be found at http://iai.asm.org/.

Editor: B. A. McCormick

---

Infection and Immunity, June 2009, p. 2367-2375, Vol. 77, No. 6
0019-9567/09/$08.00+0     doi:10.1128/IAI.01520-08
Copyright © 2009, American Society for Microbiology. All Rights Reserved.

This article has been cited by other articles:

• Lawley, T. D., Clare, S., Walker, A. W., Goulding, D., Stabler, R. A., Croucher, N., Mastroeni, P., Scott, P., Raisen, C., Mottram, L., Fairweather, N. F., Wren, B. W., Parkhill, J., Dougan, G. (2009). Antibiotic Treatment of Clostridium difficile Carrier Mice Triggers a Supershedder State, Spore-Mediated Transmission, and Severe Disease in Immunocompromised Hosts. Infect. Immun. 77: 3661-3669 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Sommer, M. O. A., Dantas, G., Church, G. M. (2009). Functional Characterization of the Antibiotic Resistance Reservoir in the Human Microflora. Science 325: 1128-1131 [Abstract] [Full Text]