An international team of scientists has studied diaper samples of nearly 650 healthy 1-year-old babies for 5 years and has discovered 10,000 species of viruses, most of them unknown until now. Far from causing children to be sick, those viruses are thought to be true allies, playing an important role in protecting us from chronic diseases.

An international collaboration of scientists identified 248 viral families in nappy samples, 232 of which were never described before. Acknowledged for their contribution, these babies will be forever registered in the virome databases, as the scientists named the new families after their first names.

The first 2-3 years of life are crucial for shaping childhood health. Amid others, the importance of early-life gut microbiota in infant’s development and later human health has been long speculated. In particular, bifidobacteria are playing an essential role in infant’s gut microbiota and immune system maturation that supports its probiotic use in that age span.

Gut health benefits begin in pregnancy

10 Nov 2021

by Cristina Sáez

Assumed for a long-time immune system training started after birth, when mom’s microbiota started colonizing the newborn, Yale University scientists point out that process may have begun much earlier, in utero.

Does gut microbiome development end by age 3?

29 Sep 2021

by Andreu Prados

Although it was previously thought that the infant gut microbiota would attain an adult-like structure by the age of 3, recent studies have suggested that the gut community of microorganisms continues to evolve in both pre-adolescents and 20-year-olds.

Restoring maternal microbes immediately after birth, in a practice dubbed ‘vaginal seeding’, has been suggested as a means of improving microbiome development in cesarean-born neonates. Two new studies come to contradictory findings, however, highlighting the need for more clinical trials before the practice is generalized.

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