Optimisation and benchmarking of targeted amplicon sequencing for mycobiome analysis of respiratory specimens

We performed ITS analysis of respiratory (sputum) samples by assessing (a) the effect of alternate DNA extraction techniques and (b) an evaluation of four different ITS primer pairs (ITS1F and ITS2; ITS1-30F and ITS1-217R; gITS7ngs and ITS4ng; Fseq and Rseq) on the mycobiome profiles generated for mock fungal communities and their respective clinical (airway) specimens.