The effect of the nasopharyngeal host microbiome on the transcriptional host response during viral infection

目前对发热性疾病的管理、治疗和研究的做法是将感染分为细菌性或病毒性。然而，对于儿科呼吸道感染，将患者分为这种二元仍然是一个诊断挑战。由于目前基于病原体的诊断的金标准的局限性，细菌感染通常通过发现强烈炎症来诊断，强烈炎症通过生物标志物C反应蛋白（CRP）或白色血细胞计数（WBC）的水平升高来注意。然而，高比例的病毒感染患者，如流感和呼吸道合胞病毒（RSV），也显示出指示强烈炎症的生物标志物特征。对于我的博士学位，我想探索决定这些不寻常的炎症免疫反应对病毒感染的因素。我的假设是，宿主对病毒感染的反应受到呼吸道微生物组中细菌的影响。

The current practice for the management, treatment and research of febrile diseases is to separate infections into either bacterial or viral. However, for paediatric respiratory infections, separating patients into this binary remains a diagnostic challenge. Due to limitations of current gold standard, pathogen based diagnostics, bacterial infections are often diagnosed from the finding of intense inflammation, which is noted from raised levels of the biomarkers C-reactive protein (CRP) or white blood cell count (WBC). However, a high proportion of patients with viral infections, such as influenza and respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), also display biomarker signatures indicative of intense inflammation. For my PhD, I want to explore the factors determining these unusual inflammatory immune responses to viral infections. My hypothesis is that the host response to viral infections is influenced by the bacteria present in the respiratory microbiome.