The Development of the Human Milk Microbiota over the First Two Years Postpartum in the Breastfeeding Longitudinal Observational Study of Mothers and Kids (BLOSOM) Cohort †
by
Ruomei Xu
1,2,3, 
Ali S. Cheema
4,
Mark P. Nicol
5,
Donna T. Geddes
1,2,3 and
Lisa F. Stinson
1,2,3,* 1
School of Molecular Sciences, The University of Western Australia, Crawley, WA 6009, Australia
2
ABREAST Network, Perth, WA 6000, Australia
3
UWA Centre for Human Lactation Research and Translation, Crawley, WA 6009, Australia
4
Telethon Kids Institute, Nedlands, WA 6009, Australia
5
School of Biomedical Sciences, The University of Western Australia, Crawley, WA 6009, Australia
*
Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.
†
Presented at the Australian Breastfeeding + Lactation Research and Science Translation Conference (ABREAST Conference 2023), Perth, Australia, 10 November 2023.
Proceedings 2023, 93(1), 3; https://doi.org/10.3390/proceedings2023093003
Published: 19 December 2023
(This article belongs to the Proceedings of Australian Breastfeeding + Lactation Research and Science Translation Conference 2023)
The human milk microbiota play an important role in mammary and infant health. However, there are limited data describing the composition and temporal variation in the milk microbiota beyond the first few months. Therefore, this study aimed to characterise the development of the human milk microbiota over the first two years postpartum and to investigate the factors that influence its composition. We performed full-length 16S rRNA gene sequencing on 608 samples collected from 86 mothers in the BLOSOM birth cohort. Similar to other populations, the milk microbiota of Western Australian women was low in diversity, and strongly dominated by Staphylococcus and Streptococcus species (14.95% and 39.04% relative abundance, respectively). Milk bacterial richness increased over time (p = 0.004), and there were significant changes in the abundances of 7 of 18 of the most abundant taxa over time. The composition of the milk microbiota was associated with numerous maternal and infant factors including infant age, maternal or infant antibiotic exposure, maternal probiotic use, parity, mode of delivery, and pre-pregnancy BMI (all p < 0.039). Our data provide new insights into how the human milk microbiota develop beyond the first few months and determinants of the milk’s bacterial composition, demonstrating that the milk microbiota are dynamic over time in the first two years postpartum.
Author Contributions
Conceptualisation, L.F.S., M.P.N. and D.T.G.; methodology, L.F.S.; formal analysis, R.X. and L.F.S.; investigation, R.X. and A.S.C.; resources, D.T.G.; data curation, R.X.; writing—original draft preparation, R.X.; writing—review and editing, L.F.S. and D.T.G.; visualisation, R.X.; supervision, L.F.S., D.T.G. and M.P.N.; funding acquisition, D.T.G. All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.
Funding
This research is funded by an unrestricted research grant from Medela AG (Switzerland).
Institutional Review Board Statement
The study was conducted in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki and approved by the Human Research Ethics Committee of The University of Western Australia (RA/4/20/4023).
Informed Consent Statement
Informed consent was obtained from all subjects involved in this study.
Data Availability Statement
Sequence data have been submitted to the NCBI SRA (BioProject Submission: SUB13951443).
Acknowledgments
The authors would like to acknowledge Erika van der Dries for collecting the samples and Matthew Payne for the use of his laboratory space and equipment.
Conflicts of Interest
D.T.G. declares their participation in the Scientific Advisory Board of Medela. AG. D.T.G. and L.F.S. receive funding from Medela AG administered through The University of Western Australia. The funders had no role in the design of the study; in the collection, analyses, or interpretation of data; in the writing of the manuscript; or in the decision to publish the results.
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© 2023 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
Share and Cite
MDPI and ACS Style
Xu, R.; Cheema, A.S.; Nicol, M.P.; Geddes, D.T.; Stinson, L.F. The Development of the Human Milk Microbiota over the First Two Years Postpartum in the Breastfeeding Longitudinal Observational Study of Mothers and Kids (BLOSOM) Cohort. Proceedings 2023, 93, 3. https://doi.org/10.3390/proceedings2023093003
AMA Style
Xu R, Cheema AS, Nicol MP, Geddes DT, Stinson LF. The Development of the Human Milk Microbiota over the First Two Years Postpartum in the Breastfeeding Longitudinal Observational Study of Mothers and Kids (BLOSOM) Cohort. Proceedings. 2023; 93(1):3. https://doi.org/10.3390/proceedings2023093003
Chicago/Turabian StyleXu, Ruomei, Ali S. Cheema, Mark P. Nicol, Donna T. Geddes, and Lisa F. Stinson. 2023. "The Development of the Human Milk Microbiota over the First Two Years Postpartum in the Breastfeeding Longitudinal Observational Study of Mothers and Kids (BLOSOM) Cohort" Proceedings 93, no. 1: 3. https://doi.org/10.3390/proceedings2023093003
