Viral and Microbial Cystic Fibrosis Lung Metagenome

CF patients undergo recurrent pulmonary exacerbations. Prognosis and treatment regimes are entirely based on clinical examinations and culture results. Patients are typically treated with a common set of IV antibiotics during pulmonary exacerbations. In addition to the improvement in lung function, the eradication of 201C pathogenic 201D microbes based on microbe-targeted assays serves as an indicator of recovery. However, there is often little correlation between the beneficial outcome and the clearance of the infection. The goal of this study is to generate a set of metagenomes and metatranscriptomes from each patient to characterize the microbial and viral communities in CF lungs associated with different perturbations, such as during exacerbations and following antibiotic treatments. Expectorated sputum samples were collected from Cystic Fibrosis individuals.