Abstract
Several factors affect gut microbiota development in early life, among which breastfeeding plays a key role. We followed 24 mother-infant pairs to investigate the associations between concentrations of selected human milk oligosaccharides (HMOs) in breastmilk, infant faeces, and the faecal microbiota composition in healthy, breastfed infants at two, six and 12 weeks of age. Lactation duration had a significant effect on breastmilk HMO content, which decreased with time, except for 3-fucosyllactose (3FL) and Lacto-N-fucopentaose III (LNFP III). We confirmed that microbiota composition was strongly influenced by infant age and was associated with mode of delivery and breastmilk LNFP III concentration at two weeks, with infant sex, delivery mode, and concentrations of 3′sialyllactose (3′SL) in milk at six weeks, and infant sex and Lacto-N-hexaose (LNH) in milk at 12 weeks of age. Correlations between levels of individual breastmilk HMOs and relative abundance of OTUs found in infant faeces, including the most predominant Bifidobacterium OTUs, were weak and varied with age. The faecal concentration of HMOs decreased with age and were strongly and negatively correlated with relative abundance of OTUs within genera Bifidobacterium, Parabacteroides, Escherichia-Shigella, Bacteroides, Actinomyces, Veillonella, Lachnospiraceae Incertae Sedis, and Erysipelotrichaceae Incertae Sedis, indicating the likely importance of these taxa for HMO metabolism in vivo.
Highlights
Several factors affect gut microbiota development in early life, among which breastfeeding plays a key role
Microbial colonisation of the infant gastrointestinal (GI) tract begins before or at birth, and in healthy, breastfed infants it progresses towards a microbial community that is dominated by bifidobacteria and is metabolically adapted to thrive on human milk[1,2]
Breastfeeding is essential for optimal colonization and maturation of the infant GI microbiota; breastmilk provides an important medium for the transfer of microbes between the mother and her infant, but it contains high concentrations of prebiotic human milk oligosaccharides (HMOs) which further facilitate microbial colonisation[6]
Summary
Several factors affect gut microbiota development in early life, among which breastfeeding plays a key role. We followed 24 mother-infant pairs to investigate the associations between concentrations of selected human milk oligosaccharides (HMOs) in breastmilk, infant faeces, and the faecal microbiota composition in healthy, breastfed infants at two, six and 12 weeks of age. The faecal concentration of HMOs decreased with age and were strongly and negatively correlated with relative abundance of OTUs within genera Bifidobacterium, Parabacteroides, Escherichia-Shigella, Bacteroides, Actinomyces, Veillonella, Lachnospiraceae Incertae Sedis, and Erysipelotrichaceae Incertae Sedis, indicating the likely importance of these taxa for HMO metabolism in vivo. Breastfeeding is essential for optimal colonization and maturation of the infant GI microbiota; breastmilk provides an important medium for the transfer of microbes between the mother and her infant, but it contains high concentrations of prebiotic human milk oligosaccharides (HMOs) which further facilitate microbial colonisation[6]. We investigated how the microbiota composition correlated with the changes in faecal HMO concentrations, as a proxy for the in vivo degradation of the measured HMOs
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