Insulin sensitivity in calves decreases substantially during the first 3 months of life and is unaffected by weaning or fructo-oligosaccharide supplementation

Abstract

Veal calves at the age of 4 to 6 mo often experience problems with glucose homeostasis, as indicated by postprandial hyperglycemia, hyperinsulinemia, and insulin resistance. It is not clear to what extent the ontogenetic development of calves or the feeding strategy [e.g., prolonged milk replacer (MR) feeding] contribute to this pathology. The objective of this study was therefore to analyze effects of MR feeding, weaning, and supplementation of short-chain fructo-oligosaccharides (FOS) on the development of glucose homeostasis and insulin sensitivity in calves during the first 3 mo of life. Thirty male Holstein-Friesian calves (18±0.7 d of age) were assigned to 1 of 3 dietary treatments: the control (CON) group received MR only, the FOS group received MR with the addition of short-chain FOS, and the solid feed (SF) group was progressively weaned to SF. The CON and FOS calves received an amount of MR, which gradually increased (from 400 to 1,400 g/d) during the 71-d trial period. For the SF calves, the amount of MR increased from 400 to 850 g/d at d 30, and then gradually decreased, until completely weaned to only SF at d 63. The change in whole body insulin sensitivity was assessed by intravenous glucose tolerance tests. Milk tolerance tests were performed twice to assess changes in postprandial blood glucose, insulin, and nonesterified fatty acid responses. Whole-body insulin sensitivity was high at the start (16.7±1.6×10(-4) [μU/mL](-1)), but decreased with age to 4.2±0.6×10(-4) [μU/mL](-1) at the end of the trial. The decrease in insulin sensitivity was most pronounced (~70%) between d 8 and 29 of the trial. Dietary treatments did not affect the decrease in insulin sensitivity. For CON and FOS calves, the postprandial insulin response was 3-fold higher at the end of the trial than at the start, whereas the glucose response remained similar. The SF calves, however, showed pronounced hyperglycemia and hyperinsulinemia at the end of the trial, although weaning did not affect insulin sensitivity. We conclude that whole body insulin sensitivity decreases by 75% in calves during the first 3 mo of life. Weaning or supplementation of short-chain FOS does not affect this age-related decline in insulin sensitivity. Glucose homeostasis is not affected by supplementation of short-chain FOS in young calves, whereas postprandial responses of glucose and insulin to a MR meal strongly increase after weaning.

Short communication: Supplementation of fructo-oligosaccharides does not improve insulin sensitivity in heavy veal calves fed different sources of carbohydrates

“…In obese dogs and horses, for example, supplementation of dietary scFOS for a period of 6 wk increased insulin sensitivity (Respondek et al, 2008;Respondek et al, 2011). In young veal calves (<3 mo old), supplementation of scFOS for 10 wk did not improve insulin sensitivity or glucose homeostasis (Pantophlet et al, 2016b). In older veal calves (10-13 wk old), however, scFOS supplementation did improve postprandial glucose homeostasis (Kaufhold et al, 2000).…”

The use of metabolic profiling to identify insulin resistance in veal calves

“…This might be attributed to multiple factors: 1] the small number of calves used in this study 2] possible differences in the metabolic profiling techniques used, and 3] possible differences in degree of the experimental contrasts in insulin sensitivity between human and calf studies. In veal calves, insulin sensitivity decreases substantially within the first weeks of life [5], which leads to smaller contrasts in insulin sensitivity in later life. One possible source of variation that can be excluded from subsequent studies is the use of multiple dietary treatments.…”

“…These problems have been identified in heavy (4–6 months old) veal calves [1–3]. In addition, a substantial decrease in insulin sensitivity is observed in calves during the first months of life [4, 5]. In a recent study with heavy veal calves raised on a high-fat or high-lactose MR diet we observed that insulin sensitivity values were low (averaging 4.2 ± 0.5 x 10 −2 [(mg/(kg*min))/(μU/mL)]), and 50% of the calves develop insulin resistance (when comparing insulin sensitivity values with human cut-off values for defining insulin resistance; [6]).…”

Symposium review: Macronutrient metabolism in the growing calf

“…Indeed, despite the low insulin sensitivity in heavy calves, glucose is virtually completely oxidized, regardless of the level of feeding (van den Borne et al, 2007). In addition, insulin peaks in calves typically follow, rather than precede glucose peaks postprandially (Vicari et al, 2008b), even in young calves (MacPherson et al, 2016;Pantophlet et al, 2016b), which differs from responses in other species and illustrates the absence of cephalic responses to a meal. Hence, insulin sensitivity appears not to be a promising target for early life metabolic programming in calves.…”

“…It should be noted that the FSIGT test was performed only after a 5-h fasting period, at which point both glucose and insulin concentrations may still have been elevated. Recently, it was demonstrated that in calves, insulin sensitivity decreases rapidly, by almost 70%, between wk 3 and 6 of age, unaffected by weaning (Pantophlet et al, 2016b). It seems therefore that insulin sensitivity in calves is quite high at birth, and decreases independent of feeding strategy in early age to very low levels when compared with other species.…”