bioRxiv preprint doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.03.04.433847; this version posted March 4, 2021. The copyright holder for this preprint (which was not certified by peer review) is the author/funder, who has granted bioRxiv a license to display the preprint in perpetuity. It is made available under aCC-BY 4.0 International license. 1 Detection of ESKAPE pathogens and Clostridioides difficile in 2 Simulated Skin Transmission Events with Metagenomic and 3 Metatranscriptomic Sequencing 4 5 Krista L. Ternusa#, Nicolette C. Keplingera, Anthony D. Kappella, Gene D. Godboldb, Veena 6 Palsikara, Carlos A. Acevedoa, Katharina L. Webera, Danielle S. LeSassiera, Kathleen Q. 7 Schultea, Nicole M. Westfalla, and F. Curtis Hewitta 8 9 aSignature Science, LLC, 8329 North Mopac Expressway, Austin, Texas, USA 10 bSignature Science, LLC, 1670 Discovery Drive, Charlottesville, VA, USA 11 12 #Address correspondence to Krista L. Ternus,
[email protected] 13 14 1 bioRxiv preprint doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.03.04.433847; this version posted March 4, 2021. The copyright holder for this preprint (which was not certified by peer review) is the author/funder, who has granted bioRxiv a license to display the preprint in perpetuity. It is made available under aCC-BY 4.0 International license. 15 1 Abstract 16 Background: Antimicrobial resistance is a significant global threat, posing major public health 17 risks and economic costs to healthcare systems. Bacterial cultures are typically used to diagnose 18 healthcare-acquired infections (HAI); however, culture-dependent methods provide limited 19 presence/absence information and are not applicable to all pathogens.