Lauren M. Nichols’s research while affiliated with North Carolina State University and other places


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Publications (4)


Indoor home climate data
  • Data
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March 2019

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32 Reads

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Lauren M. Nichols

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Ecological analyses of mycobacteria in showerhead biofilms and their relevance to human health

July 2018

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149 Reads

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4 Citations

Matthew J. Gebert

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Angela M. Oliverio

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Noah Fierer

Bacteria within the genus Mycobacterium can be abundant in showerheads, and the inhalation of aerosolized mycobacteria while showering has been implicated as a mode of transmission in nontuberculous mycobacterial (NTM) lung infections. Despite their importance, the diversity, distributions, and environmental predictors of showerhead-associated mycobacteria remain largely unresolved. To address these knowledge gaps, we worked with citizen scientists to collect showerhead biofilm samples and associated water chemistry data from 656 households located across the U.S. and Europe. Our cultivation-independent analyses revealed that the genus Mycobacterium was consistently the most abundant genus of bacteria detected in residential showerheads, yet mycobacterial diversity and abundances were highly variable. Mycobacteria were far more abundant, on average, in showerheads receiving municipal versus well water, and in U.S. households as compared to European households, patterns that are likely driven by differences in the use of chlorine disinfectants. Moreover, we found that water source, water chemistry, and household location also influenced the prevalence of specific mycobacterial lineages detected in showerheads. We identified geographic regions within the U.S. where showerheads have particularly high abundances of potentially pathogenic lineages of mycobacteria and these hot spots generally overlapped with those regions where NTM lung disease is most prevalent. Together these results emphasize the public health relevance of mycobacteria in showerhead biofilms. They further demonstrate that mycobacterial distributions in showerhead biofilms are often predictable from household location and water chemistry, knowledge that advances our understanding of NTM transmission dynamics and the development of strategies to reduce exposures to these emerging pathogens.

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Citations (1)


... In a recent large-scale study, researchers partnered with a network of citizen scientists to collect showerhead biofilm samples from 606 households across 49 of 50 U.S. states to simultaneously superimpose the identities of showerhead microbes over geographic areas where NTM-LD is most prevalent (Gebert et al., 2018). Multiple concluding findings were reported that reinforce known paradigms. ...

Reference:

Global Environmental Nontuberculous Mycobacteria and Their Contemporaneous Man-Made and Natural Niches
Ecological analyses of mycobacteria in showerhead biofilms and their relevance to human health