Dietary Zinc Supplemented in Organic Form Affects the Expression of Inflammatory Molecules in Swine Intestine.

Animals receiving Zinc (Zn) dietary supplementation with organic sources respond better to stress than inorganic Zn sources supplementation. The study aimed to identify the effect of different Zn sources on intestinal epithelial gene expression. In total, 45 pigs (9 per treatment) (77.5 ± 2.5 kg weight) were fed for 32 days, a corn-soybean meal diet without supplemented Zn (ZnR) or supplemented with 50 and 100 ppm of inorganic ZnCl (Zn50 and Zn100), and amino acid-bound organic Zn sources (LQ50 and LQ100). Gene expression changes form RNA-seq in ileum tissues of ZnR revealed changes associated with Zn insufficiency. Comparing organic with inorganic Zn sources by one-way ANOVA, pro-inflammatory cytokine () was downregulated ( = 0.03) and () upregulated ( = 0.02). To determine the role of epithelial cells in response to dietary Zn, swine intestinal organoids (enteroids) were exposed to Zn restriction, ZnCl or LQ-Zn. In enteroids, expression decreased with added Zn compared with Zn-restriction ( = 0.006) but Zn sources did not affect ( 0.05) or expression. These results suggest that organic Zn may stimulate TLR2 signaling possibly affecting immune response, while decreasing the proinflammatory cytokine expression in non-epithelial cells of intestinal mucosa.