Correlations between shower hoses biofilm microbiome and its functions and the presence of Legionella spp.

Building plumbing systems are engineered environments in which some opportunistic pathogenic bacteria proliferate in complex biofilms, interacting and finding niches within resident microbial communities. Among these, Legionella spp. are the most reported waterborne pathogen associated with disease in industrialized countries. In this study, Shotgun sequencing has been performed on the DNA coming from shower hoses biofilms collected in different locations in Switzerland. The primary aim of the work is to be able to correlate the microbiome compositions and specific functional annotation to the differential abundance of Legionella in the samples collected. This will help getting more insights about the ecology of Legionella and possibly identify conditions that can favour or not the growth of the opportunistic pathogen in plumbing systems.