Branched oligosaccharideWIKIMEDIA, CCOSTELLGut microbes isolated from human infants that showed stunted growth can boost growth in two animal models of malnutrition with the addition of certain breast milk–derived sugars to the animals’ diets, researchers reported. The study, published today (February 18) in Cell, identifies oligosaccharides in mammalian breast milk that appear critical for the maturation of the infant gut microbiome.
“This is an excellent study that highlights the importance of [mammalian] milk oligosaccharides for infant growth and development,” said Lars Bode of the University of California, San Diego, who was not involved in the work.
The results could inform “work to develop tools and levers to nudge the gut microbiota into the right direction to get durable effects on infant health,” said study coauthor David Mills from the University of California, Davis.
Mills, along with Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis’s Jeffrey Gordon and colleagues, first compared the oligosaccharide components in the breast milk of Malawian mothers whose six-month-olds showed either healthy or stunted growth.
“We were interested in milk oligosaccharides because they are largely indigestible by us but are broken down by ...
