Bacterial pathogens were detected from human exhaled breath using a novel protocol

Here, human bacterial pathogens such as H. influenzae, P. aeruginosa, E. coli, S. aureus and MRSA were detected in exhaled breath using the developed protocol that integrates the EBC collection and LAMP. For the patients recruited from the hospital, seven types of pathogens were detected from 36.5% of them, and for the remaining subjects none of those screened bacterial pathogens was detected. Importantly, some super resistant bacteria such as MRSA were detected from the exhaled breath, suggesting that breathing might be also an important bacterial transmission route. Results from throat swabs showed that 36.2% of the subjects were found to be infected with H. influenzae, P. aeruginosa, E. coli, S. maltophilia, S. aureus and MRSA. For the EBC samples, 33.3% were found to be infected with MRSA, E. coli and P. aeruginosa. Depending on the initial pathogen load in the sample, the entire protocol (EBC-LAMP) only takes 20-60 min to complete for a respiratory infection diagnosis. For different detection methods and pathogens, the agreements between the EBC and throat swabs from the same patients were found to range from 35% to 65%. Here, we have detected several bacterial pathogens including MRSA from exhaled breath, and the developed protocol could be very useful for the bedside pathogen screening particularly in remote areas where resources are significantly limited or prohibited.