Meta-analysis of effects of exclusive breastfeeding on infant gut microbiota across populations

Nhan T. Ho, Fan Li, Kathleen A. Lee-Sarwar, Hein M. Tun, Bryan P. Brown, Pia S. Pannaraj, Jeffrey M. Bender, Meghan B. Azad, Amanda L. Thompson, Scott T. Weiss, M. Andrea Azcarate-Peril, Augusto A. Litonjua, Anita L. Kozyrskyj, Heather B. Jaspan, Grace M. Aldrovandi and Louise Kuhn ()
Additional contact information
Nhan T. Ho: Columbia University
Fan Li: University of California
Kathleen A. Lee-Sarwar: Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School
Hein M. Tun: University of Alberta
Bryan P. Brown: Duke University
Pia S. Pannaraj: University of Southern California
Jeffrey M. Bender: University of Southern California
Meghan B. Azad: University of Manitoba
Amanda L. Thompson: University of North Carolina
Scott T. Weiss: Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School
M. Andrea Azcarate-Peril: University of North Carolina
Augusto A. Litonjua: University of Rochester Medical Center
Anita L. Kozyrskyj: University of Alberta
Heather B. Jaspan: Institute of Infectious Disease and Molecular Medicine
Grace M. Aldrovandi: University of California
Louise Kuhn: Columbia University

Nature Communications, 2018, vol. 9, issue 1, 1-13

Abstract: Abstract Previous studies on the differences in gut microbiota between exclusively breastfed (EBF) and non-EBF infants have provided highly variable results. Here we perform a meta-analysis of seven microbiome studies (1825 stool samples from 684 infants) to compare the gut microbiota of non-EBF and EBF infants across populations. In the first 6 months of life, gut bacterial diversity, microbiota age, relative abundances of Bacteroidetes and Firmicutes, and predicted microbial pathways related to carbohydrate metabolism are consistently higher in non-EBF than in EBF infants, whereas relative abundances of pathways related to lipid metabolism, vitamin metabolism, and detoxification are lower. Variation in predicted microbial pathways associated with non-EBF infants is larger among infants born by Caesarian section than among those vaginally delivered. Longer duration of exclusive breastfeeding is associated with reduced diarrhea-related gut microbiota dysbiosis. Furthermore, differences in gut microbiota between EBF and non-EBF infants persist after 6 months of age. Our findings elucidate some mechanisms of short and long-term benefits of exclusive breastfeeding across different populations.

Date: 2018
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (6)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-018-06473-x Abstract (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:nat:natcom:v:9:y:2018:i:1:d:10.1038_s41467-018-06473-x

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.nature.com/ncomms/

DOI: 10.1038/s41467-018-06473-x

Access Statistics for this article

Nature Communications is currently edited by Nathalie Le Bot, Enda Bergin and Fiona Gillespie

More articles in Nature Communications from Nature
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().