In vitro fermentation outcomes of arabinoxylan and galactoxyloglucan depend on fecal inoculum more than substrate chemistry.

Using in vitro fermentation conditions, this study investigated the fermentation characteristics of arabinoxylan (AX) and xyloglucan (XG) with a fecal inoculum that was collected either from humans consuming unrestricted diets or pigs fed a semi-defined diet with cellulose being the sole non-starch polysaccharide for 10 days prior to fecal collection. Metagenomic analysis revealed that microbial communities in the two types of inoculum were distinctively different, which led to distinct fermentation characteristics with the polysaccharides. The microbial communities fermented with the porcine fecal inoculum were clustered according to the fermentation time, while those fermented with the human fecal inoculum were differentiated by the substrates. Using the porcine fecal inoculum, irrespective of the substrates, Prevotella copri and the unclassified lineage rc4-4 were the dominant operational taxonomic units (OTUs) promoted during fermentation. Fermentation of wheat AX (WAX) and galacto-XG (GXG) with the human fecal inoculum, however, promoted different OTUs, except for a shared OTU belonging to Lachnospiraceae. Specifically, WAX promoted the growth of Bacteroides plebeius and a Blautia sp., while GXG promoted an unclassified Bacteroidales, Parabacteroides distasonis, Bacteroides uniformis and Bacteroides sp. 2. These changes in bacterial communities were in accordance with the short chain fatty acid (SCFA) production, where comparable SCFA profiles were obtained from the porcine fecal fermentation while different amounts and proportions of SCFA were acquired from fermentation of WAX and GXG with the human fecal inoculum. Altogether, this study indicated that the starting inoculum composition had a greater effect than polysaccharide chemistry in driving fermentation outcomes.