Metabolic Impact of Infant Formulas in Young Infants. An Outlook From the Urine Metabolome

Although breast milk is the ideal food source for newborns during the first six months of life, a high percentage of children receive infant formulas. There is evidence that specific diet habits may influence individual metabolic profile. Therefore, in newborns, such profile can be influenced by the use of infantile formulas given the composition differences that display compared to human milk. Up to now there are no reports in the literature that address this issue. Thus, this work aims to compare the metabolic profile of full-term newborns that were feed with either breast milk (n=32) or infantile formulas (n=21). Metabolic profile was established based on urine analysis through gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS) and nuclear magnetic resonance (H-NMR). Results evidenced a more gluconeogenic profile in breast fed infants. In addition, infant formula fed infants presented urinary excretion of metabolites derived from specific compounds present in this type of diet that were not observed in breast fed infants. Finally, it was observed that in infant formula fed infants there was excretion of basal levels of metabolites of clinical relevance. This results show the importance of understanding the metabolic impact of diet in newborn population in normal and pathological contexts.