fructooligosaccharide and Dermatitis--Atopic

The WHO refers to human milk as the nutritional gold standard for term infants. Human milk contains many immunomodulatory compounds, including oligosaccharides. Human-milk oligosaccharides can serve as prebiotics because the nondigestible oligosaccharides present in human milk show a clear bifidogenic effect on the gut microbiota. Dietary oligosaccharide structures that have prebiotic effects similar to human-milk oligosaccharides include galacto-oligosaccharides, fructo-oligosaccharides, and pectin-derived acidic oligosaccharides. Both animal studies and human clinical trials showed that dietary intervention with these dietary oligosaccharides in early life could lead to the prevention of atopic dermatitis, food allergy, and allergic asthma. The immune-modulating effects of these oligosaccharides are likely assisted via alteration of the intestinal microbiota or in a microbiota-independent manner by direct interaction on immune cells or both. In this review, an overview of the prebiotic role of dietary oligosaccharides on the microbiota and the microbiota-independent immune modulation by these prebiotics is provided. In addition, recent publications that report on the pathways by which the oligosaccharides might exert their direct immunomodulatory effect are summarized.

Topics: Animals; Asthma; Clinical Trials as Topic; Dermatitis, Atopic; Diet; Food Hypersensitivity; Gastrointestinal Tract; Humans; Immunologic Factors; Infant; Metagenome; Milk, Human; Models, Animal; Oligosaccharides; Prebiotics; Probiotics; Trisaccharides

Although Faecalibacterium prausnitzii is a major bacterium in the intestine of adults, which is known to have anti-inflammatory effects, the development in infants or the response to prebiotics remains unclear.. The counts of F. prausnitzii in the feces were examined by real-time polymerase chain reaction (PCR). Fecal samples were obtained from 65 atopic dermatitis (AD) infants who participated in a randomized controlled clinical trial to investigate the therapeutic effect of kestose, the smallest fructooligosaccharide.. Although the F. prausnitzii count was undetectable level in most 0- to 1-y-old infants, the count reached a level comparable to that in adults in 2- to 5-y-old infants. The bacterial number increased about 10-fold by oral administration of kestose every day for 12 wk in the younger infants, but not so much in the older infants. This bacterial increase was significantly correlated with an improvement in the AD symptoms in the older infants.. The F. prausnitzii population in the intestine reaches a level comparable to that in adult at approximately 2 y of age. Kestose efficiently stimulates the growth of this bacterium in the intestine, which might lead to an improvement in AD symptoms in infants.

Topics: Age Factors; Bacterial Load; Bifidobacterium; Child, Preschool; Dermatitis, Atopic; Faecalibacterium prausnitzii; Female; Gastrointestinal Microbiome; Humans; Infant; Infant, Newborn; Male; Oligosaccharides; Prebiotics; Real-Time Polymerase Chain Reaction