INTRODUCTION
inflammation, anemia, micronutrient deficiencies, infection, Anemia
INFLAMMATION, ANEMIA, INFECTION, IRON DEFICIENCY, ANEMIA, HEMOGLOBINOPATHIES
Many gut bacteria are in a constant battle for iron, an essential, growth-limiting nutrient. Iron plays an important role in virulence and colonization for enteropathogens such as The WHO recommends untargeted iron supplementation (30 to 60mg iron for 12 weeks) for women in countries where anemia prevalence is greater than 40%. This recommendation is based on the premise that most anemia is due to iron deficiency, which is not always the case. Anemia has many etiologies, including inflammation, infection, hemoglobinopathies, and other micronutrient deficiencies. In Cambodia, for example, the most recent national Demographic and Health Survey found that 45% of women were anemic, but only 3% were iron deficient (Due to poor bioavailability, iron absorption from oral supplements tends to be low. Simply increasing the dose of iron may not increase the amount absorbed and can lead to gut inflammation causing common gastrointestinal side effects (In our study, we used 16S rRNA gene sequencing to examine changes in the gut microbiome following 12 weeks of daily supplementation of either ferrous sulfate or ferrous bisglycinate in non-pregnant Cambodian women of reproductive age (WRA). We then used real-time PCR (qPCR) to assess the presence and abundance of 