The infant pharyngeal microbiomes: origin, impact and manipulation

Abstract

Purpose of review: there has been an exponential increase in research intoinfant microbiome evolution, and it appears that pharyngeal microbiota are associated with clinical phenotypes(e.g. infection and asthma). While broad consensus views are emerging, significant challenges and uncertainties remain.

Recent findings: infant pharyngeal microbiome research is limited by low biomass, high temporal diversity, and lack of agreed standards for sampling, DNA sequencing, and taxonomic reporting. Analysis of amplicon sequence variants and improvedcost and availability of whole genome sequencing are promising options for improving taxonomic resolution of such studies. Infant respiratory microbiomes arise, at least in part, from maternal flora (e.g. the respiratory tract and breastmilk), and are associated with environmental and clinical factors (e.g.mode of feeding and delivery, siblings, daycare attendance, birth season, and antibiotic usage). Interventional research to modify the infant pharyngeal microbiota hasrecentlybeen reported, using dietary supplements.

Summary: further work is needed to improve characterisation ofthe infant pharyngeal microbiomes, including routes of bacterial acquisition, role of environmental factors, and associations with disease phenotypes. Methodological standards are desirable to facilitate more reproducible, comparable research. Improved understanding may enable manipulation of infant pharyngeal microbiota to improve clinical outcomes.

More information

Identifiers

ORCID for Christine E Jones: orcid.org/0000-0003-1523-2368

ORCID for Robert Read: orcid.org/0000-0002-4297-6728

ORCID for Anastasia Theodosiou: orcid.org/0000-0002-0096-4825

Catalogue record

Export record

Altmetrics