INSPIRE Track 1: What is Normal Milk? Sociocultural, Evolutionary, Environmental, and Microbial Aspects of Human Milk Composition

该INSPIRE奖的部分资金来自以下计划：(A)共生、国防和自我认可计划(生物综合组织系统司)(B)新兴前沿办公室(生物局)(C)信息和智能系统司(计算机和信息科学与工程局)的信息集成和信息学及特别项目计划(D)国际科学和工程办公室的非洲/中东/南亚群组(肯尼亚、加纳)和美洲(拉丁美洲，SDC)群组。众所周知，母乳喂养可以保护婴儿免受疾病的侵扰，特别是在世界上最贫穷的地区。然而，这种保护作用的全部性质还不太清楚。理解的一个主要障碍是，对于影响全球牛奶成分巨大差异的因素，或者这种差异对婴儿健康的影响，人们几乎一无所知。该INSPIRE项目是对母乳成分的全球差异以及可能影响牛奶成分和婴儿健康的各种微生物、进化、环境和社会文化因素的首次全面调查。一个由生理学家、营养学家、人类学家、微生物学家和数学家组成的国际跨学科合作将收集来自发达国家(美国、西班牙、瑞典)和发展中国家(中非共和国、冈比亚、加纳、秘鲁和肯尼亚)的哺乳妇女及其婴儿的生物数据，并结合广泛的人类学和生态学数据。为了测试牛奶低聚糖组成、牛奶微生物区系和婴儿胃肠道微生物群之间的相关性，将使用最先进的生化和基因组技术分析牛奶样本和婴儿粪便样本。这项研究将允许对牛奶成分和婴儿喂养做法进行重要的跨文化比较；它还将利用复杂的计算方法整合广泛、多样的生物学和人类学数据，以阐明社会文化因素、进化史、环境暴露、微生物成分和牛奶成分之间的关系。研究人员预测，在一个人群中被认为是“正常”的牛奶成分，可能不会在另一个人群中支持最佳健康。这些信息对于理解如何在世界各地改善婴儿营养和整体健康的人道主义探索至关重要。此外，该项目还将为本科生、研究生和博士后科学家提供广泛的研究培训机会。

This INSPIRE award is partially funded by the following programs (a) the Symbiosis, Defense & Self-Recognition Program (Division of Integrative Organismal Systems, Biology Directorate) (b) the Emerging Frontiers Office ( Biology Directorate) (c) the Information Integration and Informatics and Special Projects programs of the Division of Information and Intelligent Systems (Directorate for Computer & Information Science & Engineering) (d) The Africa/Middle East/South Asia cluster (Kenya, Ghana) and Americas (Latin America, SDC) Cluster of the Office of International Science and Engineering. It is well-known that breastfeeding protects infants from illness, especially in the poorest regions of the world. The full nature of this protective effect, however, is less well understood. A major barrier to understanding is the fact that almost nothing is known about the factors that influence the considerable variation in milk composition around the globe, or about the effects of this variation on infant health. This INSPIRE project represents the first comprehensive investigation of the global differences in human milk composition along with the various microbial, evolutionary, environmental, and sociocultural factors that might influence both milk composition and infant health. An international, interdisciplinary collaboration of physiologists, nutritional scientists, anthropologists, microbiologists, and mathematicians will collect biological data from breastfeeding women and their infants, in concert with extensive anthropologic and ecological data, in both developed (US, Spain, Sweden) and developing countries (Central African Republic, Gambia, Ghana, Peru, and Kenya). To test the possibility of a correlation between milk oligosaccharide composition, milk microbiota, and the gastrointestinal microbiome of infants, milk samples and infant fecal samples will be analyzed using state-of-the-art biochemical and genomic techniques. This study will allow important cross-cultural comparisons of milk composition and infant feeding practices; it also will utilize sophisticated computational methods to integrate the extensive, diverse body of combined biological and anthropological data to elucidate the relationships among sociocultural factors, evolutionary history, environmental exposures, microbial constituents and milk composition. The researchers predict that what is considered "normal" milk composition in one population may not support optimal health in another. This information is crucial to the humanitarian quest to understand how infant nutrition and overall health can be improved around the world. In addition, this project will provide extensive research training opportunities for undergraduate, graduate and postdoctoral scientists.