Human milk oligosaccharides (HMOs) are complexes that play a crucial role in shaping the early-life gut microbiota. This study intends to explore whether HMO patterns are associated with the gut microbiota of infants. We included 96 Chinese breastfeeding mother-infant dyads. Breast milk and infant faecal samples were collected and tested. With milk 2'-fucosyllactose, difucosyllactose, and lacto-N-fucopentaose-I as biomarkers, we divided the mothers into secretor and non-secretor groups. HMO patterns were extracted using principal component analysis. The majority (70.7%) of mothers were categorised as secretor and five different HMO patterns were identified. After adjustment, the infants of secretor mothers exhibited a lower relative abundance of Bifidobacterium bifidum (β = -0.245, 95%CI: -0.465~-0.025). An HMO pattern characterised by high levels of 3-fucosyllactose, lacto-N-fucopentaose-III, and lacto-N-neodifucohexaose-II was positively associated with the relative abundance of Bifidobacterium breve (p = 0.014), while the pattern characterised by lacto-N-neotetraose, 6'-sialyllactose, and sialyllacto-N-tetraose-b was negatively associated with Bifidobacterium breve (p = 0.027). The pattern characterised by high levels of monofucosyl-lacto-N-hexaose-III and monofucosyl-lacto-N-neohexaose was positively associated with Bifidobacterium dentium (p = 0.025) and Bifidobacterium bifidum (p < 0.001), respectively. This study suggests that HMO patterns from mature breast milk were associated with certain gut microbiota of breastfed infants.
Keywords: human milk oligosaccharides; infant gut microbiome; mature milk HMO patterns; secretor phenotype.