Human Gut Microbiota of Healthy Individuals Show Resilience to Acute Aflatoxin B1 Exposure Despite Solvent-Driven Community Shifts

Acute aflatoxin B1 exposure (1,000–5,000 ppb) in anaerobic batch bioreactors using fecal inoculum from 17 healthy adults does not significantly change gut microbial community composition or SCFA output.

• Why it matters: It was unclear whether AFB1 directly impairs human gut microbiota or whether dysbiosis seen in vivo is driven by host-mediated effects.
• What they did: Fecal samples from 17 healthy adults were incubated with AFB1 at 1,000–5,000 ppb delivered in ethanol or corn oil, and SCFA/gas production and 16S rRNA amplicon sequencing were measured.
• The result: AFB1 remained stable with no significant microbial degradation, and solvent-driven shifts dominated, implying resilience of healthy human gut communities to direct, acute AFB1 at these concentrations.