Fig. 3

Effect of PAT and DSS-challenge on the intestinal microbial community. a Phylogenetic diversity (PD) scores over time. Group sizes were control/H2O (n = 7), PAT/H2O (n = 8), control/DSS (n = 7), and PAT/DSS (n = 8). b Comparison of microbial community structure between PAT and control groups at P21 (weaning), and between all groups at P25 (before start of DSS), P28, and P32 (end of the DSS challenge) based on unweighted UnifFrac distances as visualized by PCoA. Intra- and inter-group mean pairwise UniFrac distances are shown as bars. Intergroup community distances remain significantly greater than from P21 until day P32 for both the control and PAT-exposed groups. c Heat map showing significantly different taxa between the control/DSS (blue) and PAT/DSS (red) groups, using the linear discriminant analysis Effect Size (LEfSe) tool. Samples were from feces (P21, P25, P28, P31), or from the cecum (ce), colon (co), or ileum (il) at P34 sacrifice. Two-way ANOVA and Kruskal-Wallis tests were used for multiple comparisons. *p < 0.05, **p < 0.01, ***p < 0.001, ****p < 0.0001