2'-Fucosyllactose helps butyrate producers outgrow competitors in infant gut microbiota simulations

David M Versluis; Ruud Schoemaker; Ellen Looijesteijn; Jan M W Geurts; Roeland M H Merks

doi:10.1016/j.isci.2024.109085

2'-Fucosyllactose helps butyrate producers outgrow competitors in infant gut microbiota simulations

iScience. 2024 Feb 3;27(3):109085. doi: 10.1016/j.isci.2024.109085. eCollection 2024 Mar 15.

Authors

David M Versluis¹, Ruud Schoemaker², Ellen Looijesteijn², Jan M W Geurts², Roeland M H Merks^{1

3}

Affiliations

¹ Leiden University, Institute of Biology, 2300 RA Leiden, the Netherlands.
² FrieslandCampina, 3818LE Amersfoort, the Netherlands.
³ Leiden University, Mathematical Institute, 2300 RA Leiden, the Netherlands.

Abstract

A reduced capacity for butyrate production by the early infant gut microbiota is associated with negative health effects, such as inflammation and the development of allergies. Here, we develop new hypotheses on the effect of the prebiotic galacto-oligosaccharides (GOS) or 2'-fucosyllactose (2'-FL) on butyrate production by the infant gut microbiota using a multiscale, spatiotemporal mathematical model of the infant gut. The model simulates a community of cross-feeding gut bacteria in metabolic detail. It represents the community as a grid of bacterial populations that exchange metabolites, using 20 different subspecies-specific metabolic networks taken from the AGORA database. The simulations predict that both GOS and 2'-FL promote the growth of Bifidobacterium, whereas butyrate producing bacteria are only consistently abundant in the presence of propane-1,2-diol, a product of 2'-FL metabolism. In absence of prebiotics or in presence of only GOS, however, Bacteroides vulgatus and Cutibacterium acnes outcompete butyrate producers by consuming intermediate metabolites.

Keywords: Microbial metabolism; Microbiome.