Abstract
An unhealthy gut microbial community may act as a barrier to improvement in growth and health outcomes in response to nutritional interventions. The objective of this analysis was to determine whether the infant microbiota modified the effects of a randomized controlled trial of lipid-based nutrient supplements (LNS) in Malawi on growth and inflammation at 12 and 18 months, respectively. We characterized baseline microbiota composition of fecal samples at 6 months of age (n = 506, prior to infant supplementation, which extended to 18 months) using 16S rRNA gene sequencing of the V4 region. Features of the gut microbiota previously identified as being involved in fatty acid or micronutrient metabolism or in outcomes relating to growth and inflammation, especially in children, were investigated. Prior to correction for multiple hypothesis testing, the effects of LNS on growth appeared to be modified by Clostridium (p-for-interaction = 0.02), Ruminococcus (p-for-interaction = 0.007), and Firmicutes (p-for-interaction = 0.04) and effects on inflammation appeared to be modified by Faecalibacterium (p-for-interaction = 0.03) and Streptococcus (p-for-interaction = 0.004). However, after correction for multiple hypothesis testing these findings were not statistically significant, suggesting that the gut microbiota did not alter the effect of LNS on infant growth and inflammation in this cohort.
Highlights
An unhealthy gut microbial community may act as a barrier to improvement in growth and health outcomes in response to nutritional interventions
Previous studies have shown a link between gut microbial taxa and healthy infant growth, and the authors posit that identifying complementary foods that target the developing infant gut microbiome is crucial to developing effective treatments for malnutrition[2,12,17]
Whether characteristics of the infant gut microbiota modify the effects of a nutritional intervention on growth or inflammation
Summary
An unhealthy gut microbial community may act as a barrier to improvement in growth and health outcomes in response to nutritional interventions The objective of this analysis was to determine whether the infant microbiota modified the effects of a randomized controlled trial of lipid-based nutrient supplements (LNS) in Malawi on growth and inflammation at 12 and 18 months, respectively. Results of nutrient supplementation trials in undernourished populations have been mixed, with regard to child linear growth o utcomes[1,2,3,4] As many of these studies address relevant nutrient deficiencies in these populations, this suggests that there may be a barrier to improvement in growth outcomes. The objective of these analyses was to determine whether features of the infant gut microbiome at six months of age modify the effects of lipid-based nutrient supplements on child growth or inflammation in the iLiNS-DYAD-Malawi randomized controlled trial[20]
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