Signatures of lower respiratory tract microbiome in children with severe community-acquired pneumonia using shotgun metagenomic sequencing.

Background: Severe community-acquired pneumonia was associated with high morbidity and mortality in children. However, species-level microbiome of lower airway was sparse, and we used shotgun metagenomic next-generation sequencing to explore microbial signatures.

Methods: We conducted a prospective cohort study to recruit children under 18 who required admission to an intensive care unit for community-acquired pneumonia between December 2019 and February 2022.