Functional response to a microbial synbiotic in the gastrointestinal system of constipated children
Bibliographic record
Abstract
Abstract Background Oral microbial therapy has been studied as an intervention for a range of gastrointestinal and immunological disorders. Though emerging research suggests microbial exposure may intimately affect the gastrointestinal system, motility, and host immunity in a pediatric population, data has been inconsistent and variable, with the majority of prior studies conducted in neither a randomized nor placebo-controlled setting. The aim of this placebo-controlled study was to evaluate efficacy of a synbiotic (a prebiotic and rationally-defined microbial consortia) on increasing weekly bowel movement frequency in constipated children. Methods Sixty-four children (3-17 years of age) were randomized to receive a synbiotic composition (n=33) comprised of mixed-chain length, prebiotic oligosaccharides and nine microbial strains or placebo (n=31) for 84 days. Stool microbiota was analyzed using shotgun metagenomic sequencing on samples collected at baseline (T1) and completion (T2). The primary outcome was change from baseline of Weekly Bowel Movements (WBMs) in children compared to placebo. Results Treatment with a multi-strain synbiotic significantly (p < 0.05) increased the number of WBMs in children with low bowel movement frequency (< 4 WBMs and < 5 WBMs), irrespective of broadly distinctive microbiome signatures at baseline. Metagenomic shotgun sequencing revealed that low baseline microbial richness in the treatment group significantly anticipated improvements in constipation (p = 0.00074). Conclusions These findings suggest the potential for (i) multi-species synbiotic interventions to improve digestive health in a pediatric population and (ii) bioinformatics-based methods to predict response to microbial interventions in children. Impact Synbiotic microbial treatment exerted functional improvements in the number of spontaneous Weekly Bowel Movements in children compared to placebo Intervention induced a significant bifidogenic effect in children compared to placebo All administered probiotic species were enriched in the gut microbiome of the intervention group compared to placebo Baseline microbial richness demonstrated potential as a predictive biomarker for response to intervention
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.000 | 0.001 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Open science | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Research integrity | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.001 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".