IL-13 protects from Clostridioides difficile colitis

Clostridioides difficile infection (CDI) is the leading hospital-acquired infection in North America. We have previously discovered that antibiotic disruption of the gut microbiota decreases intestinal IL-33 and IL-25 and increases susceptibility to CDI. We further found that IL-33 promotes protection through type 2 Innate Lymphoid Cells (ILC2s), which produce IL-13. However, the contribution of IL-13 to disease has never been explored.

We used a validated model of CDI in mice, in which we neutralized via blocking antibodies, or administered recombinant protein, IL-13 to assess the role of this cytokine during infection using weight and clinical scores. Fluorescent activated cell sorting (FACS) was used to characterize myeloid cell population changes in response to IL-13 manipulation.

We found that administration of IL-13 protected, and anti-IL-13 exacerbated CDI. Additionally, we observed alterations to the monocyte/macrophage cells following neutralization of IL-13 as early as day three post infection. We also observed elevated accumulation of myeloid cells by day four post-infection following IL-13 neutralization. Neutralization of the decoy receptor, IL-13Rα2, resulted in protection from disease, likely through increased available endogenous IL-13.

Our data highlight the protective role of IL-13 in protecting from more severe CDI and the association of poor responses with a dysregulated monocyte-macrophage compartment. These results increase our understanding of type 2 immunity in CDI and may have implications for treating disease in patients.