Transcriptomic and Metabolomic Insights Into the Prebiotic Potential of Camellia Seed Oil for Enhancing Proliferation In Vitro.

Camellia seed oil (CSO), a potential prebiotic agent, can significantly increase the relative abundance of () in mice gut microbiota following oral administration, this study aims to investigate the enhancing effect in vitro. The results showed that after 24-h co-cultivation with 0.5% (v/v) CSO, the growth of increased from 11.61 ± 0.04 LogCFU/mL to 12.17 ± 0.10 LogCFU/mL ( < 0.05), accompanied by a reduction in the oxidation-reduction potential (ORP) value of the media from -126.67 ± 1.78 mV to -117.33 ± 0.72 mV ( < 0.05). Additionally, squalene and (+)-α-tocopherol, bioactive compounds present in CSO, were found to promote proliferation (squalene OD: 1.086 ± 0.002, tocopherol OD: 1.100 ± 0.003, DMSO control OD: 0.991 ± 0.003,  < 0.0001). Transcriptomic and metabolomic profiling revealed 464, 121, and 194 differentially expressed genes (DEGs) and 212, 160, and 156 differentially expressed metabolites (DEMs) in co-cultivated with CSO after 4, 16, and 24 h, respectively ( < 0.05). The upregulated DEGs and DEMs were primarily enriched in pathways associated with energy generation (e.g., , , , , succinate, phosphoenolpyruvate), nucleotide metabolism (e.g., deoxyguanosine), amino acid metabolism (e.g., , L-tyrosine), translation (e.g., , ), and environmental adaptation (e.g., , , reduced nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide). These findings suggest that various bioactive compounds present in CSO exhibit prebiotic effects on the in vitro proliferation of by facilitating nutrient utilization and environmental adaptation. This study provides insights into the extended utilization of CSO.