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Nutritional Microbiology/Microbiome/Microbe Nutrition (Poster Session)

(P27-022-24) Characteristics of Changes in the Intestinal Microbiota of Infants Within 1 Year-Old in Beijing and Its Influencing Factors

Monday, July 1, 2024
12:45 PM – 1:45 PM CT
Location: Poster Board 370

    Presenting Author(s)

  • Qianying Guo, Ph D

    associate dietitian
    Peking University People's Hospital
    Beijing, Beijing, China (People's Republic)

    • Co-Author(s)

  • XL

    Xinran Liu

    Peking University People’s Hospital, China (People's Republic)

  • MC

    Mingxuan Cui

    Peking University People's Hospital, China (People's Republic)

  • CY

    Chen Yang

    Peking University, School of Public Health, China (People's Republic)

  • SZ

    Shilong Zhao

    Peking University People’s Hospital, China (People's Republic)

  • LW

    Linlin Wang

    Peking University, School of Public Health, China (People's Republic)

  • PL

    Peng Liu

    Peking University People's Hospital, China (People's Republic)

Disclosure(s):
Qianying Guo, Ph D: No relevant financial relationship(s) with ineligible companies to disclose.


Objectives: Infancy is a critical period for the establishment of intestinal flora, which is susceptible to the influence of breastfeeding factors and others. The present study attempted to investigate the changes in the intestinal microbiota of infants up to 1 year-old and the factors influencing them.

Methods: Sixty-seven infants and their mothers were volunteered for this study, and information about mothers' dietary and breastfeeding was collected by questionnaire, and breast milk composition was detected. We determined the flora structure in the fecal samples of infants at 42 days, 6 months, and 12 months of age using 16S rRNA gene sequencing. We analysed the characteristics of changes in the intestinal flora of infants at different times and the correlation between the flora and breastfeeding factors at 12 months of age.

Results: The study population consisted of 33 (49.3%) male and 34 (50.7%) female infants. The proportion of infants who were exclusively breastfed and mixed-feeding from 0 to 6 months of age was 73.1% and 23.9%, respectively. The results of the relative abundance of the infant intestinal flora showed that the dominant phyla at 42 days of age were, in order, Firmicutes (38.8%), Proteobacteria (29.5%), Actinobacteriota (20.5%), and Bacteroidetes (11.1%), and then gradually shifted to Firmicutes (43.4%), Bacteroidetes (25.1%), Actinobacteriota (19.7%), Proteobacteria (8.9%) at the age of 12 months. Similarity analysis of community structure difference test showed that the structure of intestinal flora of infants at different time points was significantly different (p < 0.05). Alpha diversity analysis showed that the diversity of intestinal flora was increasing significantly with time (p < 0.05). Breastfeeding factors are potentially relevant to changes in alpha diversity therein.

Conclusions: The structure of the gut flora of infants under 1 year of age undergoes changes and turnover and is always dominated by Firmicutes. The diversity of intestinal flora is gradually increasing over time.

Funding Sources: This research was supported by the construction of breast milk bank based on birth cohort (2020-Z-19) grant funded by the Ausnutria Maternal and Child Nutrition Research Fund (AU-YJY-B-LX-19-018) and Hunan Engineering and Technology Research Center for Nutrition and Health Products, Innovation Platform and Talent Plan (2019TP2066).