Early-Life Intervention Using Exogenous Fecal Microbiota Alleviates Gut Injury and Reduce Inflammation Caused by Weaning Stress in Piglets

Abstract

Fecal microbiota transplantation (FMT) could shape the structure of intestinal microbiota in animals. This study was conducted to explore the changes that happen in the structure and function of microbiota caused by weaning stress, and whether early-life FMT could alleviate weaning stress through modifying intestinal microbiota in weaned piglets. Diarrheal (D) and healthy (H) weaned piglets were observed, and in the same farm, a total of nine litters newborn piglets were randomly allocated to three groups: sucking normally (S), weaned at 21 d (W), and early-life FMT + weaned at 21 d (FW). The results demonstrated that differences of fecal microbiota existed in group D and H. Early-life FMT significantly decreased diarrhea incidence of weaned piglets. Intestinal morphology and integrity were improved in the FW group. Both ZO-1 and occludin (tight junction proteins) of jejunum were greatly enhanced, while the zonulin expression was significantly down-regulated through early-life FMT. The expression of IL-6 and TNF-α (intestinal mucosal inflammatory cytokines) were down-regulated, while IL-10 (anti-inflammatory cytokines) was up-regulated by early-life FMT. In addition, early-life FMT increased the variety of the intestinal microbial population and the relative amounts of some beneficial bacteria such as Spirochaetes, Akkermansia, and Alistipes. Functional alteration of the intestinal microbiota revealed that lipid biosynthesis and aminoacyl-tRNA biosynthesis were enriched in the FW group. These findings suggested that alteration of the microbiota network caused by weaning stress induced diarrhea, and early-life FMT alleviated weaning stress in piglets, which was characterized by decreased diarrhea incidence, improved intestinal morphology, reduced intestinal inflammation, and modified intestinal bacterial composition and function.

The Role of Probiotics in Alleviating Postweaning Diarrhea in Piglets From the Perspective of Intestinal Barriers

“…More in vivo or in vitro experiments should be carried out to screen for probiotics (such as Lactobacillus ) from normal weaned healthy piglets that can stably colonize the piglet’s gut, efficiently produce antibacterial substances, competitively exclude of pathogen, improve intestinal mucosal barrier and activate the immune system to prevent PWD. Although some fecal microbiota transplantation (FMT) experiments have been carried out and achieved good results ( Ma et al., 2021 ), the effect of specific flora or strains on intestinal colonization of early piglets still needs further research. In addition, supplementing probiotics to accelerate the maturation of gut microbiota or to shape a PWD-preventing gut microbiota in weaned piglets are worthy of further study.…”

Effects of early-life cecal microbiota transplantation from divergently selected inbred chicken lines on growth, gut serotonin, and immune parameters in recipient chickens

“…In humans, fecal microbiota transplantation ( FMT ) is an effective bacteriotherapy for treating recurrent Clostridium difficile infections and other gastrointestinal infectious diseases ( Ianiro et al, 2020 ), with a potential for treating neuropsychiatric disorders ( Cooke et al, 2021 ; Settanni et al, 2021 ). Similarly, FMT has been gradually applied to treat farm animals with various health issues, such as digestive disorders (inappetence and hypomotility) in ruminants ( Mandal et al, 2017 ), resistance to African swine fever virus in pigs ( Zhang et al, 2020 ), and post-weaning diarrhea in piglets ( Ma et al, 2021 ). Hence, microbiota transplantation may have similar beneficial effects on the health and welfare of chickens.…”

Consumption of Butylated Starch Alleviates the Chronic Restraint Stress-Induced Neurobehavioral and Gut Barrier Deficits Through Reshaping the Gut Microbiota

“…Oscillibacter is another microbial taxa that sensitively responded to stress (37,38), and the abundance is found to be significantly decreased in significant depression disorder patients (39). In addition, the butylated-starch modified microbial function also facilitates the neurotransmission function through upregulating the Tryptophan synthesis and downregulating the Inositol degradation pathways.…”