Immunomodulatory feed additives might offer alternatives to antimicrobial growth promoters in poultry production.This experiment was carried out to test the effect of β-glucan supplementation on the growth performance and immune response in broilers. Total of 160 day-old broilers were randomly assigned to 4 treatment groups fed corn-soybean diets containing 0, 0.012, 0.025 or 0.05% of β-glucan supplement in a 6 week feeding experiment. Growth performance, antibody titer against New Castle vaccine, lymphocyte blastogensis, and peritoneal macrophage chemotaxis activity of broilers were evaluated. Results showed that there were no significant differences in weight gain and feed efficiency among the treatments, and no differences in antibody titer was observed. Supplementation of β-glucan did not elevate the lymphocyte blastogensis among treatments, following stimulation with different mitogens. However, supplementation with 0.025 and 0.05% β-glucan enhanced the macrophage chemotaxis activity of broilers. These results suggest that β-glucan may enhance some cell-mediated immune responses of chickens by modulate macrophages ability.

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Dipeptidyl peptidase IV (DPP IV) is a surface glycoprotein that can degrade glucagon like pepetide-1 (GLP-1) by decreasing blood sugar. Herbal medicines for diabetic therapy are widely used with acceptable efficacy but unsatisfied in advances. DPP IV was chosen as a template to employ molecular docking via Discovery Studio to search for natural phenolic compounds whether they have the inhibitory function of DPP IV. Then, docking candidates were validated and further performed signal pathway via Caco-2, C2C12, and AR42J cells. Lastly, a diet-induced diabetes in mice were applied to examine the efficacy and toxicity of hit natural phenolic products in long-term use (in vivo). After screening, curcumin, syringic acid, and resveratrol were found in high affinity with DPP IV enzymes. In enzymatic tests, curcumin and resveratrol showed potential inhibition of DPP IV. In vitro assays, curcumin inhibited of DPP IV activity in Caco-2 cells and ERK phosphorylation in C2C12 cells. Additionally, curcumin attenuated blood sugar in S961-treated C57BL/6 mice and in diet-induced diabetic ICR mice and long-term regulate HbA1c in diabetic mice. Curcumin targeted to DPP IV for reducing blood glucose, it possesses potential and alternative substitution of synthetic clinical drugs for the medication of diabetes.

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The inhibition of α-glucosidase and α-amylase is a clinical strategy for the treatment of type II diabetes, and herbal medicines have been reported to credibly alleviate hyperglycemia. Our previous study has reported some constituents from plant or herbal sources targeted to α-glucosidase and α-amylase via molecular docking and enzymatic measurement, but the hypoglycemic potencies in cell system and mice have not been validated yet. This study was aimed to elucidate the hypoglycemic efficacy of docking selected compounds in cell assay and oral glucose and starch tolerance tests of mice. All test compounds showed the inhibition of α-glucosidase activity in Caco-2 cells. The decrease of blood sugar levels of test compounds in 30 min and 60 min of mice after OGTT and OSTT, respectively and the decreased glucose levels of test compounds were significantly varied in acarbose. Taken altogether, in vitro and in vivo experiments suggest that selected natural compounds (curcumin, antroquinonol, HCD, docosanol, tetracosanol, rutin, and actinodaphnine) via molecular docking were confirmed as potential candidates of α-glucosidase and α-amylase inhibitors for treating diabetes.