Analysis of intestinal microbial biodiversity in newborns exposed to intrapartum antibiotic prophylaxis by means of a massive sequencing approach

Next-Generation DNA sequencing data from the human intestinal microbiome provides new instruments to explore the correlation between changes in microbiome composition and the host physiologic status. Some studies show that newborns have a highly unstable microbiome composition, but few information are available in literature on the potential effect due to intrapartum antibiotic prophylaxis (IAP) administrated to the mothers positive to the infection by group B Streptococcus, which affects around 10% of pregnant woman. According to this, the aim of the project is to evaluate the main effects of the mentioned IAP on microbiome composition of newborns at seven days after birth, by a massive parallel sequencing of seven different regions of 16S gene. The analysis was performed with Ion PGM platform, taking advantage from “Ion 16s Metagenomics Sequencing Technology Access Program” (LifeTechnologies). Our first results show an evident difference in the microbial composition of treated newborns, resulting in a general decrease of microbial biodiversity and an over representation of Proteobacteria, suggesting that these infants are potentially more exposed to gastrointestinal diseases.