RESEARCH ARTICLE Impact of Helminth Infections and Nutritional Constraints on the Small Intestine Microbiota Isabella M. Cattadori1,2*, Aswathy Sebastian3☯, Han Hao4☯, Robab Katani5☯, Istvan Albert3, Kirsten E. Eilertson4, Vivek Kapur1,5, Ashutosh Pathak1,2¤, Susan Mitchell1,2 1 Center for Infectious Disease Dynamics, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, 16082 PA, United States of America, 2 Department of Biology, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, 16082 PA, United States of America, 3 Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, 16082 PA, United States of America, 4 Department of a11111 Statistics, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, 16082 PA, United States of America, 5 Department of Veterinary and Biomedical Sciences, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, 16082 PA, United States of America ☯ These authors contributed equally to this work. ¤ Current address: Department of Infectious Diseases, College of Veterinary Medicine, The University of Georgia, Athens, GA 30602, United States of America *
[email protected] OPEN ACCESS Citation: Cattadori IM, Sebastian A, Hao H, Katani R, Albert I, Eilertson KE, et al. (2016) Impact of Helminth Abstract Infections and Nutritional Constraints on the Small Intestine Microbiota. PLoS ONE 11(7): e0159770. Helminth infections and nutrition can independently alter the composition and abundance of doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0159770 the gastrointestinal microbiota, however, their combined effect is poorly understood. Here, Editor: Emmanuel Serrano Ferron, Universidade de we used the T. retortaeformis-rabbit system to examine how the helminth infection and host Aveiro, PORTUGAL restriction from coprophagy/ready-to-absorb nutrients affected the duodenal microbiota, Received: February 22, 2016 and how these changes related to the acquired immune response at the site of infection.