Tanprasertsuk Jirayu, Shmalberg Justin, Maughan Heather, Tate Devon E, Perry LeeAnn M, Jha Aashish R, Honaker Ryan W
NomNomNow, Inc., Nashville, Tennessee, United States of America.
Department of Comparative, Diagnostic, and Population Medicine, College of Veterinary Medicine, University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida, United States.
PeerJ. 2021 Jun 30;9:e11648. doi: 10.7717/peerj.11648. eCollection 2021.
The gut microbiota (GM) is associated with canine health and can be impacted by diet. Dog owners in the U.S. have increasingly shown an interest in feeding their dogs a mildly cooked (MC) diet. However, its impact on canine GM and health remains largely unknown.
Healthy household dogs were tracked upon switching from various brands of extruded to MC diets for four weeks. A health assessment was completed and stool samples were collected by each owner before (day 0) and after the diet transition (day 28). Shotgun metagenomic sequencing was performed at both time points to characterize the GM.
Dogs completed the study by either completing the health assessments ( = 31) or providing stool samples at both time points ( = 28). All owners reported either better or no change in overall health at the end of the study (61% and 39%, respectively), and none reported worse overall health. Defecation frequency was also reported to be lower (58%) or about the same (35%). Principal coordinate (PCo) analysis showed a significant shift ( = 0.004) in the β-diversity of the GM upon diet transition (34.2% and 10.3% explained by the first two axes). The abundances of 70 species increased after the diet change (adjusted < 0.05), 67% and 24% of which belonged to the Lactobacillales and the Enterobacterales orders respectively. The abundances of 28 species decreased (adjusted < 0.05), 46%, 18%, and 11% of which belonged to the Clostridiales, Bacillales, and Bacteroidales orders, respectively. Lower Lactobacillales and Enterobacterales, and higher Bacteroidales at baseline were associated with a greater shift along the PCo1 axis. Protein content of the baseline diet was correlated with the shift along the PCo1 axis ( = 0.67, = 0.006).
Owners reported either improvement or no change in health in dogs transitioning from extruded kibble to MC diets for 4 weeks, but this report of health perception requires further exploration in a controlled trial. Diet change also led to a significant shift in the GM profile of healthy dogs. The magnitude of shift was associated with baseline GM and dietary protein, and warrants further examination of individualized responses and personalized nutrition in companion dogs. These results also support future investigation of the impact of a MC diet on health maintenance given its increasing popularity.
肠道微生物群（GM）与犬类健康相关，且会受到饮食的影响。美国的狗主人越来越有兴趣给他们的狗喂食轻度烹饪（MC）的饮食。然而，其对犬类GM和健康的影响在很大程度上仍不清楚。
健康的家养犬从各种品牌的膨化饲料转换为MC饮食后被跟踪四周。每位主人在饮食转换前（第0天）和转换后（第28天）完成健康评估并收集粪便样本。在两个时间点都进行了鸟枪法宏基因组测序以表征GM。
狗通过完成健康评估（n = 31）或在两个时间点都提供粪便样本（n = 28）完成了研究。所有主人在研究结束时报告整体健康状况有所改善或没有变化（分别为61%和39%），没有人报告整体健康状况变差。排便频率也被报告较低（58%）或大致相同（35%）。主坐标（PCo）分析表明，饮食转换后GM的β多样性发生了显著变化（P = 0.004）（前两个轴解释了34.2%和10.3%）。饮食改变后70个物种的丰度增加（校正P < 0.），其中67%和24%分别属于乳杆菌目和肠杆菌目。28个物种的丰度下降（校正P < 0.05），其中46%、18%和11%分别属于梭菌目、芽孢杆菌目和拟杆菌目。基线时较低的乳杆菌目和肠杆菌目以及较高的拟杆菌目与沿PCo1轴的更大变化相关。基线饮食的蛋白质含量与沿PCo1轴的变化相关（r = 0.67，P = 0.006）。
主人报告说，从膨化干粮转换为MC饮食4周的狗的健康状况有所改善或没有变化，但这种健康感知报告需要在对照试验中进一步探索。饮食变化也导致健康狗的GM谱发生显著变化。变化的幅度与基线GM和膳食蛋白质有关，有必要进一步研究伴侣犬的个体反应和个性化营养。鉴于MC饮食越来越受欢迎，这些结果也支持未来对其对健康维持影响的研究。
