Research Communications of the 27(th) ECVIM-CA Congress: Intercontinental, Saint Julian's, Malta, 14th to 16th September 2017

Disclosures: No disclosures to report. In humans, deviation from a core airway microbiota is thought to predispose to development, exacerbation or progression of respiratory diseases. Our objective was to describe changes in the airways and fecal microbiota as cats transitioned from healthy (day 0) to asthmatic, in the early (6 weeks) and chronic (36 weeks) stages. The gut microbiota influences microbial communities at distant sites. However, as asthma is a localized disease, we hypothesized that it would result in decreased richness and diversity of the lower airway microbiota, contributing to a state of dysbiosis, while the fecal microbiota would remain unaffected. Fecal, oropharyngeal (OP), and bronchoalveolar lavage (BAL) samples were collected from eight healthy research cats before (day 0) and at 6, 12, 24 and 36 weeks after experimental asthma induction using Bermuda grass allergen. Extracted DNA underwent PCR of the 16S rRNA gene. Once sequenced, richness, diversity, and relative abundance of representative operational taxonomic units (OTUs) were determined via RM ANOVA on ranks (P < 0.050). Principal component analysis (PCA) was used to visualize relatedness of samples. Differences in community composition between time-points were tested using PERMANOVA of Bray-Curtis similarity indices.