Eleutheroside B (EB) is a phenylpropanoid glycoside with anti‐inflammatory properties, neuroprotective abilities, immunomodulatory effects, antinociceptive effects, and regulation of blood glucose. The aim of this study was to investigate the effects of EB on the barrier function in the intestinal porcine epithelial cells J2 (IPEC‐J2). The IPEC‐J2 cells were inoculated into 96‐well plates at a density of 5 × 103 cells per well for 100% confluence. The cells were cultured in the presence of EB at concentrations of 0, 0.05, 0.10, and 0.20 mg/ml for 48 hr. Then, 0.10 mg/ml was selected as the suitable concentration for the estimation of transepithelial electric resistance (TEER) value, alkaline phosphatase activity, proinflammatory cytokines mRNA expression, tight junction mRNA and protein expression. The results of this study indicated that the supplementation of EB in IPEC‐J2 cells decreased cellular membrane permeability and mRNA expression of proinflammatory cytokines, including interleukin‐6 (IL‐6), interferon‐γ (INF‐γ), and tumour necrosis factor‐α (TNF‐α). The supplementation of EB in IPEC‐J2 cells increased tight junction protein expression and anti‐inflammatory cytokines, interleukin 10 (IL‐10) and transforming growth factor beta (TGF‐β). In addition, the western blotting and real‐time quantitative polymerase chain reaction (RT‐qPCR) results indicated that EB significantly (p < 0.05) increased the mRNA and protein expression of intestinal tight junction proteins, Claudin‐3, Occludin, and Zonula Occludins protein‐1 (ZO‐1). Therefore, dietary supplementation of EB may increase intestinal barrier function, tight junction protein expression, anti‐inflammatory cytokines, and decrease proinflammatory cytokines synthesis in IPEC‐J2 cells.

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The gut health is an important part of the growth process of piglets, especially during weaning period. Diarrhoea in weaned piglets is mainly caused by impairing intestinal barrier function (Cao et al., 2018;Groschwitz & Hogan, 2009). Soybean agglutinin (SBA) is an anti-nutritional factor which damages the normal structure of the small intestine, leads to microvilli atrophy, and reduce viability of epithelial cells. Therefore, SBA causes small intestine brush-like membrane disorder. Furthermore, SBA decreases the number of epithelial cells and lowers the synthesis of secretory enzymes (enterokinase, alkaline phosphatase, etc.) (Buttle et al., 2001), and changes the distribution of tight junction protein in the cell membrane surface, by reducing the relative expression of Occludin and Claudin-3 protein, and increases the permeability of cell membrane (Pan et al., 2013).