A French study by the Institut Pasteur and Inserm shows that food diversification plays an important role in the immune development of babies. This would therefore protect them from certain diseases.
Our intestinal flora, and the bacteria that populate it, play an important role in our immune development. Scientists have already proven that the mother’s diet during pregnancy has an influence on the intestinal microbiota of the unborn baby. A new study, conducted by French researchers from the Institut Pasteur and Inserm (National Institute of Health and Medical Research), shows that after birth, infant food diversification also had an important role. It would protect against certain inflammatory diseases. The results of thestudy are published in the journal Immunity.
A diversified diet promotes the development of the microbiota
Dietary diversification consists of introducing foods other than milk in the baby’s diet, such as vegetables, fruit or meat. At birth, the infant’s microbiota is mainly composed of bifidobacteria and lactobacilli. When infants are introduced to new foods, the number of bacteria is multiplied by ten to a hundred, and their microbiota develops. The researchers conducted tests on mice. They found that this development was accompanied by a strong immune response. “We were able to show that this mechanism occurs in a very specific time window: between 2 and 4 weeks in mice, which would correspond to 3 and 6 months in humans”, explains Professor Gérard Eberl, main author of the study. ‘study.
Antibiotics disrupt the intestinal flora
He adds, “We then hypothesized that the existence of a fixed time window indicates that the immune response is time-programmed and therefore has a unique function in the development of the immune system.” To demonstrate this idea, the research team administered antibiotics to mice precisely during this “determined time window”. Antibiotics are already known to disrupt the microbiota.
These mice were then found to be more prone to certain inflammatory diseases, such as intestinal allergies, colorectal cancer and colitis. In other words, when the intestinal microbiota is destroyed by antibiotics, the immune reaction does not occur. The Institut Pasteur and Inserm intend to validate these results with other studies, and determine the benefits of dietary diversification on other diseases, such as neurodegenerative diseases for example.
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