A huge global population growth required enough dietary sources (particularly proteins) to meet the progressing demands. Consequently, poultry production advanced rapidly in many countries over the world (Scanes, 2007). On the other hand, European Union was excluded antibiotic growth promoters (AGPs) in animal foods as an attempt to overcome devastating antibiotic resistance issue (Castanon, 2007), but antibiotic residual in meat was still considered a dominant risk and challenge for both poultry producers and consumers. Accordingly, this promotes employment of various alternatives like euobiotics (Jouany and Morgavi, 2007), organic acids (Dibner and Butin, 2002), prebiotics (Gibson et al., 2017), and probiotics (Rijkers et al., 2010). Recently, alpha-monoglycerides were consumed widely as an alternative to APGs. Alpha-monoglycerides are a family of compounds, which are formed by a fatty acid attached to the first, usually called alpha, carbon of the triacylglycerol via a covalent bond by esterification (Bedford and Gong, 2018). Although many kinds of fatty acids can be contributed to the alpha-monoglycerides like; propionic (C 3 H 6 O 2), butyric (C 4 H 8 O 2), caprylic (C 8 H 16 O 2), and capric (C 10 H 20 O 2), but lauric acid (C 12 H 24 O 2) is the favorite one, making alpha-monolaurin (in short called monolaurin). Interestingly, lauric acid occurs in the nature abundantly forming about 50% of the coconut oil (Liau et al., 2011), also monolaurin has characters of both fatty acids (lipid soluble) and glycerol (water soluble), that means amphiphilic compound, hence it can be administered orally with drinking water or diet of poultry (Carpo et al., 2007).

| Fasciolosis is a worldwide disease of man and animals result in huge economic losses. The objective of this study was to characterize for the first time Fasciola gigantica in Iraq employing molecular approaches. In this work, 65 adult fasciola worms were isolated from sheep liver of different age and both sex during May-August 2017, in Kirkuk city, Iraq. Molecular analysis conducted on the internal transcribed spacer 1 to characterize the species of parasite depending on the sequence analysis. Results reveal that the isolated worms were Fasciola gigantica and they have a great similarity, up to 100%, compared with other global isolates. In addition, results documented a single nucleotide polymorphism, at the 276 th nucleotide of the studied fragment, and the isolates of our project highly related to various global isolates by using phylogenetic tree analysis. In conclusion,our isolates are faithfully analogous to global isolates with common SNP at 276 th nucleotide, and ITS1 gene considers a novel marker in identifying Fasciola gigantica and study the relation with other isolates.

This study was conducted to investigate the 18S rRNA gene of Fasciola gigantica obtained from the liver of cattle live in Aqrah city, Iraq. Fifty-nine Fasciola flukes were collected through routine investigation from livers of naturally infected local cattle (42 cows), from May to August 2017, at the central slaughterhouse of Aqrah city, Kurdistan region of Iraq, the flukes were washed by PBS and then fixed in ethanol. Genomic DNA was extracted, and a 560 bp fragment was amplified by PCR, subsequent by sequencing of PCR products. A remarkable result of this project was the deposition of our gene isolate in GenBank (Accession No. MG786553). However, it was confirmed by the sequence results that isolate species was F. gigantica, and interestingly our samples sequences have alignment match of 100% with many international isolates, without genetic mutations or variations. It is concluded that molecular study could be utilized for both diagnosis and differential diagnosis of parasites with huge precise. Also, an 18S rRNA gene is a perfect fragment for molecular study and phylogenetic analysis of F. gigantica, also our samples have 100% alignment match with universal isolates.

Echinococcus granulosus (E. granulosus) is a dog tapeworm cestoda; it is larval stage responsible to cystic echinococcosis, one of the most common and dangerous worldwide zoonotic parasitic disease. The aim of this study was the molecular identification of the local strain of E. granulosus isolated from sheep liver slaughtered in the principal abattoir of Aqrah city, Northern of Iraq during Jun-Nov. 2017. In this study, 37 sheep liver infected by E. granulosus, 12 of high DNA purity fertile (have protoscolices) cyst of them were considered. A molecular study conducted on the mitochondrial NADH dehydrogenase 1 (nad1) gene. Results demonstrated that E. granulosus isolates were sheep strain (G1) genotype, with fascinating highly corresponding 95% and 96% to global isolates, particularly to north African and Mediterranean countries, by employing phylogenetic tree analysis. So, the isolates of our project were deposited in Genbank (accession No. MG792129). This study findings provide that the local isolates of E. granulosus from sheep liver in Aqrah city, Northern of Iraq are loyally equivalent to global strains and isolates, in addition, nad1 gene considers a perfect biomarker in a molecular identification and phylogenetic study of this parasite.

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