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If the eyes are the window to the soul, then the gut microbiome is a window to future health. Evidence continues to mount that shows the significance gut microbiota has on a multitude of health conditions and disease states. Now, new data from investigators at the University of Colorado suggests that evaluating the gut microbiota of infants may help identify children who are at risk for becoming overweight or obese. Investigators showed that the gut microbiota composition at two years of life is associated with body mass index (BMI) at age 12. Also, the BMI at age 2 was not significantly higher in children who later became overweight/obese, indicating that gut microbiota composition may be the earliest warning sign for detecting obesity.   

"Our study provides more evidence that the gut microbiota might be playing a role in later obesity," notes lead study investigator Maggie Stanislawski, Ph.D., a research associate at the Colorado School of Public Health LEAD center. "If our findings can be confirmed by other studies, the gut microbiota might play an important part of the obesity prediction algorithm, to identify at-risk kids early in life, before they start to gain any excess weight that might put them at risk for later obesity."

Findings from the new study,which also included co-authors Dana Dabelea, MD, PhD, Director of the Lifecourse Epidemiology of Adiposity and Diabetes (LEAD) center and Brandie Wagner, PhD, associate research professor of biostatistics and informatics, were published in mBio.

This is an excerpt from Genetic Engineering & Biotechnology News.