Exhaled Breath Condensate is a Poor Surrogate for the Pulmonary Microbiota in Healthy Individuals

The goal of this project was to determine if Exhaled Breath Condensate (EBC) could be used in place of BAL for studying the pulmonary microbiome. To this end, respiratory samples were obtained from 22 healthy volunteers. 16S amplicon sequencing was performed with many technical replicates. After comparing subject communities, sample reproducibility, and sample 16S levels it was determined that EBC is a poor replacement for BAL or other respiratory samples.