Prebiotics effects in vitro of polysaccharides from tea flowers on gut microbiota of healthy persons and patients with inflammatory bowel disease.

Polysaccharides from the flowers of tea (Camellia sinensis L.) plant (TFPS) were considered as potential functional components mainly playing the role in the distal intestines. In the present study, effects of TFPS on compositions of gut microbiota of feces from healthy persons and patients with inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) were investigated in vitro. Microbial communities in normal feces were more diverse than those in IBD feces. After fermentation of TFPS for 24 h under simulated anaerobic conditions, significant changes were observed in the composition of intestinal microbes (enhanced the relative abundances of Klebsiella, Dialister, Megasphaera, Collinsella, Lactobacillus and Bifidobacterium while decreased Prevotella, Clostridium XlVa, Alistipes, Clostridium XlVb, Akkermansia, Ruminococcus, Butyricimonas, Clostridium XVIII, Ruminococcus and Butyricicoccus for the normal feces; increased Escherichia/Shigella, Enterococcus, Collinsella, Lactobacillus and Bifidobacterium while decreased Enterobacter, Streptococcus, Bacteroides, Clostridium XlVa, Megasphaera, Roseburia, Granulicatella, Akkermansia and Fusobacterium for the IBD feces) and their metabolites, short-chain fatty acids (from 4.54 ± 0.43 to 12.88 ± 1.59 mM for the normal feces and from 5.21 ± 0.51 to 7.61 ± 0.81 mM for the IBD feces). The results illustrated that TFPS had probiotics promoting effect on the normal and IBD intestinal environments, however, might have a pro-inflammatory effect on IBD.