{"doi":"10.1128/aem.71.5.2318-2324.2005","title":"Quantitative Real-Time PCR Assays To Identify and Quantify Fecal\n            <i>Bifidobacterium</i>\n            Species in Infants Receiving a Prebiotic Infant Formula","abstract":"<jats:title>ABSTRACT</jats:title>\n          <jats:p>\n            A healthy intestinal microbiota is considered to be important for priming of the infants' mucosal and systemic immunity. Breast-fed infants typically have an intestinal microbiota dominated by different\n            <jats:italic>Bifidobacterium</jats:italic>\n            species. It has been described that allergic infants have different levels of specific\n            <jats:italic>Bifidobacterium</jats:italic>\n            species than healthy infants. For the accurate quantification of\n            <jats:italic>Bifidobacterium adolescentis</jats:italic>\n            ,\n            <jats:italic>Bifidobacterium angulatum</jats:italic>\n            ,\n            <jats:italic>Bifidobacterium bifidum</jats:italic>\n            ,\n            <jats:italic>Bifidobacterium breve</jats:italic>\n            ,\n            <jats:italic>Bifidobacterium catenulatum</jats:italic>\n            ,\n            <jats:italic>Bifidobacterium dentium</jats:italic>\n            ,\n            <jats:italic>Bifidobacterium infantis</jats:italic>\n            , and\n            <jats:italic>Bifidobacterium longum</jats:italic>\n            in fecal samples, duplex 5′ nuclease assays were developed. The assays, targeting rRNA gene intergenic spacer regions, were validated and compared with conventional PCR and fluorescent in situ hybridization methods. The 5′ nuclease assays were subsequently used to determine the relative amounts of different\n            <jats:italic>Bifidobacterium</jats:italic>\n            species in fecal samples from infants receiving a standard formula or a standard formula supplemented with galacto- and fructo-oligosaccharides (OSF). A breast-fed group was studied in parallel as a reference. The results showed a significant increase in the total amount of fecal bifidobacteria (54.8% ± 9.8% to 73.4% ± 4.0%) in infants receiving the prebiotic formula (OSF), with a diversity of\n            <jats:italic>Bifidobacterium</jats:italic>\n            species similar to breast-fed infants. The intestinal microbiota of infants who received a standard formula seems to resemble a more adult-like distribution of bifidobacteria and contains relatively more\n            <jats:italic>B. catenulatum</jats:italic>\n            and\n            <jats:italic>B. adolescentis</jats:italic>\n            (2.71% ± 1.92% and 8.11% ± 4.12%, respectively, versus 0.15% ± 0.11% and 1.38% ± 0.98% for the OSF group). In conclusion, the specific prebiotic infant formula used induces a fecal microbiota that closely resembles the microbiota of breast-fed infants also at the level of the different\n            <jats:italic>Bifidobacterium</jats:italic>\n            species.\n          </jats:p>","journal":"Applied and Environmental Microbiology","year":2005,"id":22242,"datarank":12.842201633742732,"base_score":5.6937321388027,"endowment":5.6937321388027,"self_citation_contribution":0.8540598208204051,"citation_network_contribution":11.988141812922327,"self_endowment_contribution":0.8540598208204051,"citer_contribution":11.988141812922327,"corpus_percentile":null,"corpus_rank":null,"citation_count":296,"citer_count":200,"citers_with_citation_signal":200,"citers_with_endowment":200,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_dataset_confidence":null,"is_oa":false,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"has_version_chain":false,"published_date":null,"algorithm_id":"datarank_citation_only_1hop_v6","ranking_scope":"data_only","authors":[{"id":140508,"name":"Jan Knol","orcid":null,"position":1,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":140506,"name":"Monique Haarman","orcid":null,"position":0,"is_corresponding":false}],"reference_count":0,"raw_metadata":{"has_enrichment":true,"base_score":5.6937321388027,"endowment":5.6937321388027,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"views":0,"has_version_chain":false,"is_dataset":false,"is_oa":false,"pmid":"15870317","pmcid":"PMC1087546","openalex_id":"https://openalex.org/W2111764708","authors":[],"funders":[],"total_grants":0,"fwci":29.3151,"citation_percentile":0.99889118,"influential_citations":11,"citation_trend":[{"year":2012,"count":18},{"year":2013,"count":17},{"year":2014,"count":15},{"year":2015,"count":17},{"year":2016,"count":10},{"year":2017,"count":10},{"year":2018,"count":22},{"year":2019,"count":8},{"year":2020,"count":14},{"year":2021,"count":9},{"year":2022,"count":8},{"year":2023,"count":2},{"year":2024,"count":8},{"year":2025,"count":10},{"year":2026,"count":2}],"oa_status":"green","license":"https://journals.asm.org/non-commercial-tdm-license","oa_locations":[{"url":"http://dx.doi.org/10.1128/AEM.71.5.2318-2324.2005","host_type":"repository"},{"url":"https://europepmc.org/articles/pmc1087546?pdf=render","host_type":"GREEN"},{"url":"http://dx.doi.org/10.1128/AEM.71.5.2318-2324.2005","host_type":"repository"},{"url":"https://journals.asm.org/doi/pdf/10.1128/AEM.71.5.2318-2324.2005","host_type":"publisher"},{"url":"https://doi.org/10.1128/aem.71.5.2318-2324.2005","host_type":"journal"},{"url":"https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/15870317","host_type":"repository"},{"url":"http://europepmc.org/pmc/articles/PMC1087546","host_type":"repository"}],"fields_of_study":["Probiotics and Fermented Foods","Gut microbiota and health","Infant Nutrition and Health","Medicine","Biology","Bifidobacterium","Colony Count, Microbial","Double-Blind Method","Feces","Humans","Infant","Infant Formula","Infant, Newborn","Polymerase Chain Reaction","Species Specificity"],"mesh_terms":["Bifidobacterium","Double-Blind Method","Feces","Humans","Infant","Infant, Newborn","Species Specificity","Colony Count, Microbial","Polymerase Chain Reaction","Infant Formula"],"keywords":["Bifidobacterium","Bifidobacterium longum","Bifidobacterium bifidum","Bifidobacterium breve","Biology","Microbiology","Feces","Prebiotic","Infant formula","Breast milk","Bifidobacterium animalis","Gut flora","Lactobacillus","Bacteria","Immunology","Food science","Genetics","Biochemistry"],"sdg_mappings":[{"sdg_number":0,"sdg_label":"Life in Land"}],"linked_datasets":[],"clinical_trials":[],"software_tools":[],"database_accessions":[{"name":"gen"}],"source":"live","citation_network_status":"fetched"},"created_at":"2026-06-06T18:24:20.304813Z","pmid":null,"pmcid":null,"fwci":null,"citation_percentile":null,"influential_citations":0,"oa_status":null,"license":null,"views":0,"total_file_size_bytes":0,"version_count":0,"clinical_trials":[],"software_tools":[],"db_accessions":[],"linked_datasets":[],"topics":[]}