Microbial source tracking of human and animal fecal contamination in Ecuadorian households.

ABSTRACT: Exposures to both human and animal feces pose human health risks, particularly for young children in low- and middle-income country (LMIC) settings where domestic animals are common, water and sanitation infrastructure is often limited, and enteropathogen transmission is high. Microbial source tracking (MST) markers specific to feces from humans and particular animal types can be used to identify the provenance of microbial contamination, yet most MST studies explore few household environmental sample types, limiting the understanding of how marker utility varies by matrix. We validated qPCR assays for six MST markers and quantified their prevalence in 585 samples from 59 households spanning an urban-rural gradient in northwestern Ecuador. We used GenBac3 to test for general fecal contamin

SUBMITTER: Jesser KJ 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12838389 | biostudies-literature | 2026 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature