Fecal microbiota in cats with naturally-occurring Tritrichomonas foetus infection

Tritrichomonas foetus is a common cause of chronic colitis and diarrhea in domestic cats worldwide. Infections caused by this protozoan are notoriously difficult to treat as many isolates are resistant to current therapies and relapse is common. Our objective in this study was to characterize the impact of naturally occurring T. foetus infection on the colonic microbiota of cats using Illumina-based 16S rRNA gene sequencing of archived fecal DNA.