Figure 2.

Example individual patient barplots illustrating changes with age (in months) in relative abundance of genera, bacterial load (16S rRNA copies per swab), alpha diversity changes (measured by Inverse Simpson’s) and clinical variables. Clinical variables illustrated include: antibiotic administration at the time of sample collection (Intraveous [IV], oral and nebulised [nebs]); bacterial culture results, and presence of respiratory tract symptoms at the time of sample collection. All infants were on prophylactic antibiotics at the time of sample collection. Four individual patient barplots are shown. Little change was seen in bacterial load, the Inverse Simpson’s diversity index or community structure (shown by the barplot) with changes in symptoms, growth of P.aeruginosa or antibiotic treatment.