After five years spent analyzing the stools of 647 one-year-old Danish babies, an international team assures, in the review Nature Microbiology, having found no less than 10,000 species of virus, most of which have yet to be described. Fortunately, nothing to fear, they all belong to a very specific category of viruses, bacteriophages. As their name suggests, they “exclusively infect bacteria”, precise ScienceAlert.
More and more laboratories are focusing their research on the microbiota, this microbial kingdom that we live in and which, in turn, makes our lives a little easier. Essentially made up of bacteria, the microbiota also contains populations of archaea, fungi and viruses.
By comparing the genomes, the researchers have “found 248 families [de virus] of which only 16 were known”, reports the Australian science news site. The research team named these new species after the names of the children who took part in the research. In the future, virologists will talk about Sylvesterviridae or even of Tristanviridae when they talk about these newcomers.
Among the 10,000 viruses identified, 800 had already been detected in the stools of adults. The researchers deduce that at birth, we are colonized by bacteriophages which do not remain in us throughout our existence. These “bacteriophage babies” are gradually being replaced by “adult bacteriophages”, summary ScienceAlert.
According to the researchers, this difference in the diversity of viruses between adults and children is partly explained by our eating habits. For example, the Bifidobacteriumbacteria capable of digesting breast milk, are abundant in the microbiota of children, which also harbor bacteriophage viruses specific to Bifidobacterium. With age and the gradual cessation of milk ingestion, adults no longer show, or very little, Bifidobacterium in their microbiota. Consequently, the proportion of specific bacteriophages also declines. Without prey, predators disappear.
2023-05-05 12:36:24
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