IMPACT OF FUNCTIONAL FOODS ON GUT HEALTH OF POST-WEANING PIGLETS

Post-weaning is the most crucial period in pig management. Associated with weaning are marked changes to the histology and biochemistry of the gut which cause decreased digestive and absorptive capacity and contribute to post-weaning diarrhoea. In last years, the interest in developing management and feeding strategies to stimulate gut development and health in newly-weaned pigs was increasing. In order to increase general health in post-weaning piglets and be alternative to in-feeding antibiotic, three trials were created in this thesis to determine the utilizations of some functional foods which have been widely used to improve growth performance while minimizing the use of antibiotics and rather expensive feed ingredients in weaned piglets. We utilized essential oils (Thymol and Cinnamaldehyde, EO) and/or enzymes (Xylanase and \u3b2-glucanase, XB) in the first 2 trials. The first trial mainly focused on the effects of those additives on general parameters such as performance and digestibility of weaned piglets. To investigate the possible protective effects of EO and/or XB on health status in weaned piglets, we created a model of challenge using Escherichia coli in the second trial. After first two investigations, we intended to enlarge the categories of functional foods and determine the effects on regulation of systemic inflammatory reaction and, in addition, we supposed that initial body weight might also influence the regulation. Therefore, the third trial was desined to determine the effects of dietary cocktail (bovine colostrums, cranberry extract, encapsulated essential oil, yeast-derived products, the probiotic Pediococcus acidilactici MA18/5M, vitamins A, D, E and B complex, seleno-methionine) and body weight on inflammatory cytokines and time responses under Lipopolysaccharides challenge in early weaned piglets. In the first trial, a total of 192 weaned piglets (Stambo HBI Dalland 40, 24 d) with an average initial body weight of 8.10 kg were allocated according to body weight into 4 experimental treatments (12 replicates per treatment with 4 piglets per replicate). Each group was fed the basal diet alone or supplemented with either essential oils or enzymes, or their combination. There was no effect of essential oils and/or enzymes supplementation on the growth performance of piglets. However, the combination of essential oils and enzymes decreased feed conversion ratio during the last week. Although the fecal digestibilities of all the piglets were increased from d 21 to 35 (P < 0.001), no effect of essential oils or enzymes or the combination on the fecal digestibility was observed. All the additives significantly decreased counts of Coliforms at 42 days of the trial (P < 0.001). Dietary enzymes improved gut morphology by decreasing crypt depth, increasing villus:crypt ratio and reducing the number of macrophages (P < 0.001). Supplementation of essential oils and the combination with enzymes also improved gut morphology by decreasing crypt depth (P = 0.065; P < 0.001), and decreasing the number of lymphatic follicles (P = 0.002; P < 0.001) and macrophages (P < 0.001). No effect of additives on mRNA expression of inflammatory cytokines was observed in ileal mucosa. Results showed that diet supplementation with EO and/or XB had positive effects on intestinal bacterial counts and gut morphology, although there was no significant diet effect on grow performance or digestibility. In the second trial, 192 weaned piglets (Stambo HBI Dalland 40, 8.64 kg) were allocated according to body weight into eight experimental treatments (6 replicates per treatment with 4 piglets per replicate). The treatments were in a factorial arrangement: 1) dietary treatments [a weaned piglet control diet (CTR), CTR + 0.05 g/kg essential oils (EO), CTR + 0.1 g/kg enzymes (XB), and CTR + 0.05 g/kg EO + 0.1 g/kg XB] and 2) with or without an E. coli challenge. On d 8, half of piglets in each dietary group were challenged with E. coli. E. coli challenge significantly impaired growth performance, induced severe diarrhea, increased populations of E. coli, Clostridia and Coliforms, depressed antioxidant activities, damaged gut morphology and promoted TLR-4 and TNF-\u3b1 mRNA expression in ileal mucosa (P < 0.05). In the E. coli challenge group, dietary enzymes or combinated with essential oils improved feed efficiency compared with control treatment during the last week (P = 0.025; P = 0.020). The Coliforms populations in the cecum of challenged piglets fed combination of essential oils and enzymes were lower than control treatment (P < 0.001). In the E. coli challenge group, supplemented essential oils and/or enzymes improved gut morphology by increasing villus height and villus:crypt ratio and decreasing crypt depth (P < 0.001). The positive effects on intestinal bacterial counts and gut morphology suggests that supplementation of EO and/or XB might improve the protective capacity against pathogenic bacteria when piglets were submitted to a bacterial challenge. In the third study, a total of 256 Yorkshire 7 Landrace weaned piglets (20 \ub1 1 d) were allocated into eight experimental treatments (8 replicates per treatment with 4 piglets per replicate). The treatments were in a factorial arrangement: 1) dietary treatments: a basal weaning diet added [spray-dried plasma protein (PP) (CTR), PP + antibiotic (ATB), PP + dietary cocktail (DC), or bovine colostrum + the dietary cocktail (BC+DC)] and 2) low weight (LW) or high weight (HW). At 37 d of age, 2 piglets in each pen were injected with LPS. Stimulations of LPS and PMA in PBMCs of piglets significantly induced TNF-\u3b1, IL-8 and IL-10 (P 0.05). Piglets had low weight tended to increase the concentration of IL-8 (P = 0.106) and IL-10 (P = 0.098) in the PBMCs stimulated by LPS 0.5\ub5g/ml LPS and the concentration of IL-10 (P = 0.097) in PMA stimulated PMBC compared with high weight animals. Infection with LPS increased (P 0.05). At 4 h after challenge, low weight piglets had partially greater serum concentrations of TNF-\u3b1 (P = 0.046), IL-6 (P = 0.158), IL-8 (P = 0.179) and IL-10 (P = 0.185) than high weight animals. Dietary cocktail or combined with bovine colostrum may replace plasma protein and antibiotics and weight difference may influence the production of inflammatory cytokines after infected by LPS. In conclusion, we observed that supplementation of functional foods as essential oils and enzymes might strengthen protective capacity of weaned piglets against pathogenic bacteria by decreasing negative intestinal bacterial counts and improving gut morphology. Dietary cocktail or combined with bovine colostrums, at the amount used in this work, may replace plasma protein and antibiotics. Besides, weight difference may influence the production of inflammatory cytokines after infected by LPS

Properties of a general quaternion-valued gradient operator and its applications to signal processing

The gradients of a quaternion-valued function are often required for quaternionic signal processing algorithms. The HR gradient operator provides a viable framework and has found a number of applications. However, the applications so far have been limited to mainly real-valued quaternion functions and linear quaternionvalued functions. To generalize the operator to nonlinear quaternion functions, we define a restricted version of the HR operator, which comes in two versions, the left and the right ones. We then present a detailed analysis of the properties of the operators, including several different product rules and chain rules. Using the new rules, we derive explicit expressions for the derivatives of a class of regular nonlinear quaternion-valued functions, and prove that the restricted HR gradients are consistent with the gradients in the real domain. As an application, the derivation of the least mean square algorithm and a nonlinear adaptive algorithm is provided. Simulation results based on vector sensor arrays are presented as an example to demonstrate the effectiveness of the quaternion-valued signal model and the derived signal processing algorithm

Filtering and Tracking with Trinion-Valued Adaptive Algorithms

A new model for three-dimensional processes based on the trinion algebra is introduced for the first time. Compared with the pure quaternion model, the trinion model is more compact and computationally more efficient, while having similar or comparable performance in terms of adaptive linear filtering. Moreover, the trinion model can effectively represent the general relationship of state evolution in Kalman filtering, where the pure quaternion model fails. Simulations on real-world wind recordings and synthetic data sets are provided to demonstrate the potentials of this new modeling method

Investigation on viscosity and non-isothermal crystallization behavior of P-bearing steelmaking slags with varying TiO2 content

The viscous flow and crystallization behavior of CaO-SiO2-MgO-Al2O3-FetO-P2O5-TiO2 steelmaking slags have been investigated over a wide range of temperatures under Ar (High purity, >99.999 pct) atmosphere, and the relationship between viscosity and structure was determined. The results indicated that the viscosity of the slags slightly decreased with increasing TiO2 content. The constructed nonisothermal continuous cooling transformation (CCT) diagrams revealed that the addition of TiO2 lowered the crystallization temperature. This can mainly be ascribed to that addition of TiO2 promotes the formation of [TiO6]-octahedra units and, consequently, the formation of MgFe2O4-Mg2TiO4 solid solution. Moreover, the decreasing viscosity has a significant effect on enhancing the diffusion of ion units, such as Ca2+ and [TiO4]-tetrahedra, from bulk melts to the crystal–melt interface. The crystallization of CaTiO3 and CaSiTiO5 was consequently accelerated, which can improve the phosphorus content in P-enriched phase (n2CaO·SiO2-3CaO·P2O5). Finally, the nonisothermal crystallization kinetics was characterized and the activation energy for the primary crystal growth was derived such that the activation energy increases from −265.93 to −185.41 KJ·mol−1 with the addition of TiO2 content, suggesting that TiO2 lowered the tendency for the slags to crystallize

Partial Wave Analysis of J/ψ→γ(K+K−π+π−)J/\psi \to \gamma (K^+K^-\pi^+\pi^-)

BES data on $J/\psi \to \gamma (K^+K^-\pi^+\pi^-)$ are presented. The $K^*\bar K^*$ contribution peaks strongly near threshold. It is fitted with a broad $0^{-+}$ resonance with mass $M = 1800 \pm 100$ MeV, width $\Gamma = 500 \pm 200$ MeV. A broad $2^{++}$ resonance peaking at 2020 MeV is also required with width $\sim 500$ MeV. There is further evidence for a $2^{-+}$ component peaking at 2.55 GeV. The non-$K^*\bar K^*$ contribution is close to phase space; it peaks at 2.6 GeV and is very different from $K^{*}\bar{K^{*}}$.Comment: 15 pages, 6 figures, 1 table, Submitted to PL

Administration of a novel plant extract product via drinking water to post-weaning piglets : effects on performance and gut health

The present study evaluated the effects of a novel plant extract (PE) product (GrazixTM) on the performance and gut health of weaned piglets challenged with Escherichia coli. The PE was a standardised mixture of green tea leaves (Camellia sinensis) and pomegranate fruit (Punica granatum) obtained by using the LiveXtractTM process. A total of 144 piglets were weaned at 24 days and allocated to 8 for a 35-day experiment with a 2 7 2 7 2 factorial design comparing different treatments (water without product (CT) or 8 \u3bcl/kg per day PE in drinking water (PE)), feeding regimens (ad libitum (AD) or restricted (RE)) and oral E. coli challenges on day 9 (sham ( 12 ) or infected ( +)). There were six pens per group with three piglets per pen. On day 35, 24 of the RE feeding piglets were slaughtered. It was found that PE supplementation increased the average daily gain (ADG) from day 28 to day 35 ( P =0.03) and increased the gain to feed ratio (G : F) from day 7 to day 14 ( P = 0.02). RE feeding led to lower feed intake in piglets during the 1st week ( P<0.01), 2nd week ( P = 0.06), 3rd week ( P = 0.05), and throughout the course of the overall study period ( P = 0.05). E. coli challenge decreased the ADG and G : F ratio from day 7 to day 14 ( P = 0.08 and <0.01, respectively) and increased the faecal score (higher values indicate more severe diarrhoea) on days 14, 21, 28 and 35 ( P<0.01). PE supplementation decreased the faecal score in the challenged piglets during the 1st week post-challenge ( P<0.01). E. coli challenge increased the faecal E. coli level on day 14 ( P = 0.03) and increased the Enterobacteriaceae level on day 35 ( P<0.01). Reduced faecal E. coli was observed on days 14 and 35 ( P = 0.05 and 0.02, respectively), and reduced Enterobacteriaceae ( P<0.01) was found on day 35 in the PE animals. RE feeding increased the faecal Lactobacillus, Enterobacteriaceae and E. coli levels on day 35 ( P = 0.02, <0.01 and <0.01, respectively). These results suggest that PE supplementation may improve the gut health status of post-weaning piglets and counteract some of the negative effects that occur when piglets are challenged with E. coli

Effect of dried tangerine peel extract supplementation on the growth performance and antioxidant status of broiler chicks

The aim of this study was to evaluate the effects of dried tangerine peel extract (DTPE) supplementation on the growth performance and immune and antioxidant status of broiler chicks. A total of 525day-old, male, Arbour Acres (AA) broiler chicks were fed a basal diet (CTR) either with or without 80, 160, 240 and 480mg DTPE/kg diet. The chicks were randomly assigned into five dietary groups for a 42-day experiment. There were seven replicates per group and 15 chicks per replicate. At 42 days of age, two birds from each cage were selected for blood sampling. The dietary DTPE supplementation linearly increased the body weight and the average daily gain (p=.03; p=.03) and quadratically increased the average daily feed intake (p=.02) during the starter period. In addition, the plasma lysozyme level in the 80 or 160mg/kg DTPE group increased compared to the CTR group (p=.02 and .07, respectively). Chicks fed 80-mg/kg DTPE reduced the malondialdehyde concentration (p=.02) compared with birds fed the CTR diets. Moreover, the plasma glutathione peroxidase activities in the low DTPE dietary groups (80 and 160mg/kg) were higher than in the CTR (p<.01) and 240mg/kg DTPE group (p<.01 and p=.02, respectively). The results of the present study indicate that dietary DTPE with low supplemental dosage (<= 160mg/kg) might positively modulate the systemic antioxidative defence property of chicks

Effects of plant polyphenols and mannan-oligosaccharides on growth performance, antioxidant defense system and inflammatory responses of ileal mucosa in Escherichia coli Challenged piglets

The objective of the current study was to evaluate the possible protective effects of nutritional supplements (plant polyphenols (PP) mixture containing anthocyanin, catechins, chlorgenic and oleuropein as active ingredients, mannan oligosaccharide (MOS) and PP+MOS) on growth performance, systemic antioxidant capacity and gut health in piglets under Escherichia coli challenged condition. Ninety six weanling piglets (Stambo HBI Dalland 40) (22-d-old) were homogenously allocated to 24 pens and fed a basal diet for one week. After the adaptation period, piglets were divided into 4 treatments (6 replicates with 4 piglets per treatment) and fed a basal diet or the basal diet supplemented with 0.1% of PP, MOS or PP+MOS for 6 weeks. At 21 and 25 d, half of the piglets in each treatment were orally inoculated with 4 ml of E.coli (1 7109cfu/ml) or same amount of saline water. Plasma samples collected at 7, 21, 25, 27 and 34 d and ileac mucosa samples prepared at 25 and 27 d were determined for antioxidative property and intestinal inflammatory responsive parameters. Dietary PP+MOS worsened the feed efficiency throughout the experiment. Compared to PP+MOS treatment, control group had better feed conversion ratio (FCR) during first two weeks, dietary MOS improved feed efficiency during 7 - 14 d, 0 - 34 d and 0 - 42 d, and dietary PP decreased FCR throughout the trial. Supplementation of PP markedly enhanced the systemic antioxidant property with higher total antioxidant capacity and lower malondialchehyche content compared to control or PP+MOS treatment at 21 d. At 4 d post infection (DPI), challenge didn\u2019t affect antioxidant capacity, dietary PP or MOS increased plasma GSH-Px activity. Increased plasma Malondialdehyde content, decreased plasma total antioxidant capacity (TAOC) and catalase (CAT) activity were observed at 6 DPI. Reduced TAOC were seen in challenged piglets, dietary PP or MOS increased TAOC compared to PP+MOS diet, dietary PP or PP+MOS increased CAT activity than basal or MOS diet at 13 DPI. Challenged increased plasma ceruloplasmin at 4 and 6 DPI, dietary PP or PP+MOS decreased ceruloplasmin compared to basal diet at 6 DPI. Increased ileac activities of inducible nitric oxide synthase (iNOS) and myeloperoxidase (MPO) as well as nitric oxide (NO) production were observed in challenged piglets at 4 and 6 DPI. At 6 DPI, Dietary PP significantly inhibited the elevation of MPO activity and iNOS activity as well as NO production due to challenge. The overall results demonstrated that nutritional supplementation PP improved growth performance and dietary PP or MOS improved feed efficiency in presence of E.coli challenge. Dietary PP or MOS had the potential to improve the antioxidant property, and dietary PP favorably modulated gut mucosa inflammatory response induced by E.coli infection. Dietary combination of PP and MOS did not show effects and even was adverse to growth performance probably due to some unclear interactions between PP and MOS that warranted further research

Effect of plant extract on growth performance, antioxidant defense system and gut health in weanling pigs infected with Escherichia coli

This study was conducted to evaluate the efficacy of plant extract on growth performance, systemic antioxidant defense and gut health in weanling pigs infected with Escherichia coli virus. One hundred and forty-four weanling pigs (Stambo HBI Dalland 40) (24-d-old) were homogenously allocated to 8 treatments according to body weight and sex (6 replicates with 3 pigs per treatment). Treatments followed a 2 × 2 × 2 factorial design with 2 types of water treatment (control and plant extract (PE) addition), 2 kinds of feed regimen (ad libitum and restricted) and 2 levels of E. coli virus (with and without). PE was supplemented to pigs from 8 PM to 8 AM through drinking water (the amount of the product was estimated at 0.0728 ml/pig/day) every day. After 9 d of 35-d period of drinking the treatments, half of the pigs in each water treatment received an orally inoculation of 4 ml solution containing 109cfu/ml of the virulent E. coli 0149: F4 (K88)-positive strain. Plasma samples were collected at 0, 6, 19 and 35 days of the trial and ileac mucosa samples were prepared at 35 d for antioxidative property and intestinal inflammatory responsive parameters. Supplementation of PE significantly increased average daily gain (ADG) from 28 to 35d, and decreased feed conversion ratio (FCR) from 7 to 14 d, from 28 to 35 d and from 0 to 35 d. Restricted the feed induced to animals have lower ADG from 28 to 35d, ADFI from 7 to 14d and from 14 to 21 d than piglets who were fed as ad libitum, but animals had high FCR in restrictive groups from 21 to 28 days of the trial. After E.coli challenge, low ADG from 14 to 21d and ADFI from 28 to 35 and the whole phase were observed compared to non-challenge animals, and also challenge groups had higher FCR than non-challenge animals from 7 to 14 d. There were significant interactions among treatment, regime and challenge on bacterial counts of Lactobacilli at 14 d, Enterobacteriaceae at 35 d and E.coli at 14 d. Addition of PE significantly decreased the bacterial counts of Enterobacteriaceae and E.coli at 35d of the trial. Fed animals by restrictive way increased the bacterial counts of Lactobacilli, Enterobacteriaceae and E.coli at 35 d of the trial. Injection of E.coli virus induced to high bacteria counts of Enterobacteriaceae at 35 d and E.coli at 21 d. The significant interactions between treatment and challenge on faecal score were observed at 28 and 35 d. Supplementation of PE decreased the faecal score throughout the trial. Pigs after injection of E. coli virus had high faecal scores at 14, 21, 28 and 35 d compared to without challenge. There was significant interaction between treatment and challenge on T-AOC at 19 days of the trial. PE treatment had low GSH-Px at day 6 compared to Control group. Restrictively fed animals increased SOD at 35d. Challenge induced to the significant increase of GSH-Px at 19d and MDA at 35d. After infection of E. coli, there were significant interactions among treatment, regime and challenge on HGB at 35 d and HCT at 19d. Supplementation of PE increased the concentration and ratio of Eosinophils at 19 days of the trial. Restrictive feeding induced to significant increase of HGB, HCT, RDW-SD, RDW-CV, Monocytes, ratio of Monocytes and Eosinophilsat 35 days of the trial. Injection of E.coli increased WBS, RDW-CV, Neutrophils, Basophils, ratio of Eosinophils and Basophils at 19 d, meanwhile, it also increased WBS, MCHC, PLT, Neutrophils, Lymphocytes, Monocytes and Basophils at 35d. At slaughtering, there was no significant interaction on inflammatory parameters between challenge and treatment in the intestinal mucosa of restrictive feeding animals. While challenge induced to significant high MPO. Regard to histomorphometry of ileum in piglets fed restricted diet, supplementation of PE in combination with E. coli inoculation had highest crypt depth compared with others groups, and control group in combination with E. coli injection had highest Macrophages number. Briefly, supplementation of PE improved growth performance and faeces population in the face of E. coli challenge