PlasmidHostFinder: Prediction of Plasmid Hosts Using Random Forest

Abstract

Antimicrobial resistance is a global health threat to humans and animals, causing high mortality and morbidity while effectively ending decades of success in fighting against bacterial infections. Plasmids confer extra genetic capabilities to the host organisms through accessory genes that can encode antimicrobial resistance and virulence. In addition to lateral inheritance, plasmids can be transferred horizontally between bacterial taxa. Therefore, detection of the host range of plasmids is crucial for understanding and predicting the dissemination trajectories of extrachromosomal genes and bacterial evolution as well as taking effective countermeasures against antimicrobial resistance.