THE ONSET AND SEVERITY OF ULCERATIVE COLITIS IN IL-10 -/- MICE IS NOT DEPENDENT ON FECAL MICROBIOTA TRANSPLANTATION FROM ULCERATIVE COLITIS PATIENTS

Abstract Inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) is a chronic inflammatory condition that affects around 1% of the U.S population. IBD comprised Chron’s Disease and Ulcerative Colitis (UC), with UC having higher incidence rate. believed to be caused by immune dysfunction several environmental factors. Specifically in UC, bacterial dysbiosis positively correlated colitis severity incidence. Thus, we propose genetically susceptible mice colonized human colitis-associated bacteria will exhibit early onset increased compared fecal microbiota from healthy individuals. To test this hypothesis, germ-free IL-10-/- an average age 20 weeks were gavaged orally samples individuals severe patient calprotectin level 1947 ug/mg. The Activity Index (DAI) was calculated based on occult blood, weight loss, stool consistency, grimace. DAI used assess weekly transplanted for eight weeks.16S rRNA sequencing analysis showed significant difference alpha (Shannon Index) beta diversity (unweighted UniFrac) between donors indicating (p=.0001; p=.001). donor had reduction species richness. Furthermore, recipient clustered their composition. Compared individual-associated bacteria, colitic-associated did not significantly increase or IL-10 -/- mice. there no differences scores, organ weights, gut permeability treatments. study demonstrates alone sufficient induce predisposed