Liu TianYu, Yuan Yanhan, Wei Jinying, Chen Jiayi, Zhang Feng, Chen Juanjuan, Zhang Jinping
College of Food Science and Technology, Shanghai Ocean University, Shanghai, China.
Department of Pediatrics, Shanghai Sixth People's Hospital Affiliated to Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine, Shanghai, China.
Front Pediatr. 2025 Jan 6;12:1500069. doi: 10.3389/fped.2024.1500069. eCollection 2024.
Breast milk is the primary source of nutrition during early life, and existing research indicates that the development of jaundice in breastfed newborns may be linked to specific nutrients or bioactive substances present in breast milk. However, the association between the microbiota and small-molecule metabolites in breast milk and the development of neonatal jaundice remains unproven. This study aimed to investigate the development of jaundice in breastfed neonates in relation to breast milk microbiota and metabolites.
Based on the conditions of exclusive breastfeeding, we selected healthy newborns without significant jaundice and their mothers on day 4 (96-120 h after birth) as the healthy control group, and jaundiced newborns and their mothers as the jaundice group. Breast milk samples were collected from mothers in both groups on postnatal day 4 and analyzed for microbiota and small-molecule metabolites using 16S rRNA gene sequencing and an liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry techniques.
A total of 104 mother-child pairs were included in the study, of which 51 pairs were in the healthy control group and the other 53 pairs were in the jaundice group. Our results demonstrated that there was no significant difference between the species composition and diversity of the breast milk flora in the healthy control and jaundice groups. At the genus level, the abundance of , , and was significantly higher in the breast milk of the healthy control group than in the jaundice group. Metabolomics analysis revealed a total of 27 significantly different metabolites between the two groups. Notably, breast milk from the healthy control group had elevated levels of 24 metabolites, predominantly lipids family, including sphingolipids, phospholipids, and fatty acid derivatives.
This study suggests that there is a link between the development of neonatal jaundice and breast milk microbiota and metabolites. Breast milk from mothers of healthy newborns contains higher levels of beneficial bacteria and lipid family compared to mothers of newborns with jaundice. This study offers new insights into the relationship between breastfeeding and neonatal jaundice.
母乳是婴儿早期的主要营养来源，现有研究表明，母乳喂养的新生儿黄疸的发生可能与母乳中存在的特定营养素或生物活性物质有关。然而，母乳中的微生物群和小分子代谢物与新生儿黄疸发生之间的关联仍未得到证实。本研究旨在探讨母乳喂养新生儿黄疸的发生与母乳微生物群和代谢物之间的关系。
基于纯母乳喂养的条件，我们选择出生后第4天（出生后96 - 120小时）无明显黄疸的健康新生儿及其母亲作为健康对照组，以及黄疸新生儿及其母亲作为黄疸组。在产后第4天从两组母亲中采集母乳样本，采用16S rRNA基因测序和液相色谱 - 串联质谱技术分析微生物群和小分子代谢物。
本研究共纳入104对母婴，其中51对在健康对照组，另外53对在黄疸组。我们的结果表明，健康对照组和黄疸组母乳菌群的物种组成和多样性之间没有显著差异。在属水平上，健康对照组母乳中 、 和 的丰度显著高于黄疸组。代谢组学分析显示两组之间共有27种显著不同的代谢物。值得注意的是，健康对照组母乳中24种代谢物水平升高，主要是脂质家族，包括鞘脂、磷脂和脂肪酸衍生物。
本研究表明新生儿黄疸的发生与母乳微生物群和代谢物之间存在联系。与黄疸新生儿的母亲相比，健康新生儿母亲的母乳中有益菌和脂质家族的含量更高。本研究为母乳喂养与新生儿黄疸之间的关系提供了新的见解。
