Metabolic adaption to extracellular pyruvate triggers biofilm formation in Clostridioides difficile

We applied time-course transcriptomics and genetics to identify sigma factors, metabolic processes and adhesins that drive biofilm formation. These analyses revealed that extracellular pyruvate induces biofilm formation in the presence of DOC. In the absence of DOC, pyruvate supplementation was sufficient to induce biofilm formation in a process that was dependent on pyruvate transport by the membrane protein CstA. Total RNA was extracted from 3 independent biological replicates of 630 C. difficile strains at 3 conditions with 120µM, 240µM and without Deoxycholate at 9h, 14h, 24h and 48h (36 samples).