I am attempting a scoping review on the amount of horizontal gene transfer among bacteria under antibiotic pressure (details are still a work in progress). I actually want to find out if different doses of the same antibiotic would effect the genome differently, would a bigger dose increase the spread of resistant genes via HGT in the colon, or would is the dose itself not play any role? But I cannot seem to find literature on how different doses of the same antibiotic affect the spread of plasmids via horizontal gene transfer in vivo. Am I missing something or is this simply unexplored?
First, the low antibiotic concentration causes microbiota discomfort but the high persistent concentration forces the creation of new strains which are more suitable for the new environment. This not new and cannot be an information you should hope to find. It's a given. Second, the colon microbiota have been exposed to different antibiotics before your study and continue to do so except you monitor infant experimental animals with no prior exposure. The resistance state of the infant microbiota must in fact be characterized to show that the resistance is that induced by your study. However, see the document attached and pay attention to rule 5. The references thereat support the dose-dependent resistance state selection. Article Five rules for resistance management in the antibiotic apoca...
Hope it helps
I'm sure dosage will have some effect but probably over a narrow range. Length of time of exposure is likely to be equally important. Remember that the antibiotic is not itself affecting or causing the spread, but rather imposing a selection on the population and letting rare events get amplified (by rare event here I mean some sort of transfer event).
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