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Maternal FUT2 genotype in relation to risk of acute infections and rotavirus vaccine shedding in infancy
Author(s) -
Adkins Grace E.,
Thorman Alexander,
Conrey Shan C.,
Cline Allison R.,
Staat Mary A.,
Payne Daniel C.,
Piasecki Alexandra M.,
Burke Rachel M.,
Bowen Michael D.,
Morrow Ardythe L.
Publication year - 2020
Publication title -
the faseb journal
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.709
H-Index - 277
eISSN - 1530-6860
pISSN - 0892-6638
DOI - 10.1096/fasebj.2020.34.s1.01761
Subject(s) - medicine , rotavirus , vaccination , genotype , viral shedding , immunology , pediatrics , cohort , incidence (geometry) , breast milk , virus , biology , gene , biochemistry , physics , optics
The human FUT2 gene codes fucosyltransferase2, an enzyme that catalyzes the production and secretion of H‐antigen in bodily fluids and tissues. FUT2 status has been associated with risk of infection for some pathogens. In addition, mothers who are homozygous positive or heterozygous for the FUT2 gene produce a class of oligosaccharides in their milk that can act as decoy receptors for some selected pathogens. The link between maternal FUT2 status and illnesses in breast‐fed infants is not clear. The Pediatric Respiratory & Enteric Virus Acquisition and Immunogenesis Longitudinal (PREVAIL) Cohort study of mother‐infant pairs in Cincinnati, OH assessed whether an epidemiologic association may exist between maternal FUT2 genotype and incidence of acute gastroenteritis (AGE), acute respiratory infection (ARI), and rotavirus vaccine shedding in their infants. We expected that the exclusively breastfed children of FUT2+ mothers would have lower incidences of infection due to the unique breastmilk oligosaccharide composition. We included all 75 mother‐infant pairs who exclusively breastfed their infants, which provided a total of 1,243 child‐weeks of follow‐up from birth to 6 months. All mothers were genotyped for FUT2 by PCR. Of these, 40 (53%) infants were vaccinated against rotavirus and had ≥1 weekly stool sample collected within 8 weeks after vaccination and tested by real time RT‐PCR assays to determine vaccine shedding. Infant infection data came from weekly maternal reports of AGE and ARI that were collected by using an automated text messaging system. Infants of FUT2+ mothers were found to have longer duration of rotavirus shedding post‐vaccination than babies of FUT2 − mothers (p=0.007). Additionally, infants of FUT2+ mothers had more AGE symptomatic study weeks (5.6%) than children of FUT2 − mothers, who had no symptomatic AGE weeks (p<0.001). Similarly, infants of FUT2+ mothers had ARI with fever for approximately 2.7% of study weeks, whereas babies of FUT2 − mothers had no cases of ARI with fever (p=0.006). In this ongoing study, we plan to continue our analysis to include the infant’s own FUT2 status and medically‐attended illness. Support or Funding Information CDC grant number U191P001059, IP‐16‐004