Applied Sciences, Health and Life Sciences, Northumbria University, Newcastle, UK.
Translational and Clinical Research Institute, Newcastle University, Newcastle, UK.
Curr Opin Microbiol. 2023 Oct;75:102379. doi: 10.1016/j.mib.2023.102379. Epub 2023 Aug 28.
Acquisition and development of the gut microbiome are vital for immune education in neonates, especially those born preterm. As such, microbial communities have been extensively studied in the context of postnatal health and disease. Bacterial communities have been the focus of research in this area due to the relative ease of targeted bacterial sequencing and the availability of databases to align and validate sequencing data. Recent increases in high-throughput metagenomic sequencing accessibility have facilitated research to investigate bacteriophages within the context of neonatal gut microbial communities. Focusing on unexplored viral diversity, has identified novel bacteriophage species and previously uncharacterised viral diversity. In doing so, studies have highlighted links between bacteriophages and bacterial community structure in the context of health and disease. However, much remains unknown about the complex relationships between bacteriophages, the bacteria they infect and their human host. With a particular focus on preterm infants, this review highlights opportunities to explore the influence of bacteriophages on developing microbial communities and the tripartite relationships between bacteriophages, bacteria and the neonatal human host. We suggest a focus on expanding collections of isolated bacteriophages that will further our understanding of the growing numbers of bacteriophages identified in metagenomes.
肠道微生物组的获得和发展对新生儿的免疫教育至关重要，尤其是那些早产儿。因此，微生物群落已在产后健康和疾病的背景下得到了广泛研究。由于靶向细菌测序相对容易，并且有数据库可以对齐和验证测序数据，因此细菌群落一直是该领域研究的重点。最近高通量宏基因组测序的普及促进了对新生儿肠道微生物群落中噬菌体的研究。关注未被探索的病毒多样性，已经确定了新的噬菌体种类和以前未被描述的病毒多样性。在这样做的过程中，研究强调了噬菌体与健康和疾病背景下细菌群落结构之间的联系。然而，关于噬菌体、它们感染的细菌及其人类宿主之间复杂关系的许多问题仍然未知。本文特别关注早产儿，强调了探索噬菌体对发育中微生物群落的影响以及噬菌体、细菌和新生儿人类宿主之间三方关系的机会。我们建议专注于扩大分离噬菌体的收集，这将进一步加深我们对在宏基因组中鉴定出的越来越多的噬菌体的理解。
