Figure 3.

The CART tree analysis shows the affiliations between EAEC genes and duration of diarrhea treated as continuous data. N is the number of children. The number 0 in each branch indicates the absence of a gene and the number 1 indicates the presence of a gene. The EAEC genes included in the analysis were sat, sepA, pic, sigA, pet, astA, aap, aggR, aaiC, aatA, ORF3, agg3/4C, agg3A, aafA, aggA, agg4A, and agg5. Each branch in the CART tree terminates in a “node,” which represents a specific set of genes, or absence of genes, with a statistical significant association with different durations of diarrhea in days. Strains lacking the aatA gene were associated with diarrhea with the longest median duration (74 days). EAEC strains with the combination of the aatA and astA genes were associated with prolonged diarrhea with a higher median duration (38 days) compared with EAEC strains lacking the astA gene and presence or absence of the pic gene (29 and 12 days, respectively).