About the Authors

Ian J. Davis

ian.davis@effem.com

Affiliation Waltham Centre for Pet Nutrition, Mars Petcare UK, Leicestershire, United Kingdom

Corrin Wallis

Affiliation Waltham Centre for Pet Nutrition, Mars Petcare UK, Leicestershire, United Kingdom

Oliver Deusch

Affiliation Waltham Centre for Pet Nutrition, Mars Petcare UK, Leicestershire, United Kingdom

Alison Colyer

Affiliation Waltham Centre for Pet Nutrition, Mars Petcare UK, Leicestershire, United Kingdom

Lisa Milella

Affiliation Veterinary Dental Surgery, Surrey, United Kingdom

Nick Loman

Affiliation Centre for Systems Biology, University of Birmingham, Birmingham, United Kingdom

Stephen Harris

Affiliation Waltham Centre for Pet Nutrition, Mars Petcare UK, Leicestershire, United Kingdom

Competing Interests

The authors have the following interests. This work was funded by Mars Petcare UK, the employer of Ian. J. Davis, Corrin Wallis, Oliver Deusch, Alison Colyer and Stephen Harris. Lisa Milella is employed by The Veterinary Dental Surgery. A patent has been filed based on information from this work. There are no products in development or marketed products to declare. This does not alter the authors' adherence to all the PLOS ONE policies on sharing data and materials, as detailed online in the guide for authors.

Author Contributions

Conceived and designed the experiments: IJD CW OD LM SH. Performed the experiments: IJD CW OD LM. Analyzed the data: IJD CW OD AC NL SH. Contributed reagents/materials/analysis tools: OD AC NL LM. Wrote the manuscript: IJD CW OD CW LM NL SH.