Department of Maternal and Child Health, Gillings School of Global Public Health, The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, North Carolina, United States of America.
PLoS One. 2013 May 23;8(5):e64315. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0064315. Print 2013.
It is generally believed that the infant's microbiota is established during the first 1-2 years of life. However, there is scarce data on its characterization and its comparison to the adult-like microbiota in consecutive years.
To characterize and compare the intestinal microbiota in healthy young children (1-4 years) and healthy adults from the North Carolina region in the U.S. using high-throughput bacterial phylogenetic microarray analysis.
Detailed characterization and comparison of the intestinal microbiota of healthy children aged 1-4 years old (n = 28) and healthy adults of 21-60 years (n = 23) was carried out using the Human Intestinal Tract Chip (HITChip) phylogenetic microarray targeting the V1 and V6 regions of 16S rRNA and quantitative PCR.
The HITChip microarray data indicate that Actinobacteria, Bacilli, Clostridium cluster IV and Bacteroidetes are the predominant phylum-like groups that exhibit differences between young children and adults. The phylum-like group Clostridium cluster XIVa was equally predominant in young children and adults and is thus considered to be established at an early age. The genus-like level show significant 3.6 fold (higher or lower) differences in the abundance of 26 genera between young children and adults. Young U.S. children have a significantly 3.5-fold higher abundance of Bifidobacterium species than the adults from the same location. However, the microbiota of young children is less diverse than that of adults.
We show that the establishment of an adult-like intestinal microbiota occurs at a later age than previously reported. Characterizing the microbiota and its development in the early years of life may help identify 'windows of opportunity' for interventional strategies that may promote health and prevent or mitigate disease processes.
一般认为，婴儿的微生物群是在生命的头 1-2 年内建立的。然而，关于其特征及其与成年类似微生物群在连续几年中的比较的数据却很少。
使用高通量细菌系统发育微阵列分析，对来自美国北卡罗来纳州的健康幼儿（1-4 岁）和健康成年人的肠道微生物群进行特征描述和比较。
使用针对 16S rRNA V1 和 V6 区的人类肠道芯片（HITChip）系统发育微阵列对 1-4 岁健康儿童（n = 28）和 21-60 岁健康成年人（n = 23）的肠道微生物群进行详细的特征描述和比较，并进行定量 PCR。
HITChip 微阵列数据表明，放线菌、芽孢杆菌、梭状芽胞杆菌 IV 簇和拟杆菌门是幼儿和成人之间存在差异的主要菌门样群。厚壁菌门 XIVa 菌属在幼儿和成人中同样占优势，因此被认为是在早期建立的。属水平显示，幼儿和成人之间有 26 个属的丰度存在显著的 3.6 倍（更高或更低）差异。与来自同一地区的成年人相比，美国幼儿双歧杆菌的丰度显著高出 3.5 倍。然而，幼儿的微生物群多样性低于成年人。
我们表明，成年样肠道微生物群的建立比以前报道的要晚。对生命早期的微生物群及其发育进行特征描述可能有助于确定干预策略的“机会窗口”，这些策略可能促进健康并预防或减轻疾病进程。
