Beijing Key Laboratory of Captive Wildlife Technology, Beijing Zoo, Beijing, China.
Vet Med Sci. 2023 Nov;9(6):2927-2936. doi: 10.1002/vms3.1260. Epub 2023 Sep 9.
The prevalence of prebiotic has increased substantially over the past decades. Little is known on its metabolic effects in zoo herbivores. We investigated the difference in faecal metabolites to characterize the composition and pathways involved after feeding inulin in zoo Baird's tapirs (Tapirus bairdii).
Faecal samples were collected from before inulin treatment group and after treatment groups in six adult tapirs and analysed using untargeted liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry methods. The differential metabolites identified and metabolic pathways involved were analysed using KEGG annotation.
The results demonstrated significant alterations in faecal metabolites and metabolic pathways in comparison to the control group. The amounts of differential metabolites and metabolic pathways tended to enrich with time after the treatment. We found that tryptophan and purine metabolism were relevant to the important metabolic pathways of the metabolite differences.
The findings suggest that inulin may have potential applications in captive wildlife, which may provide insights into the effects of prebiotic supplementation on gut metabolites and highlights further research in this field.
在过去几十年中，益生元的流行程度显著增加。然而，关于其在动物园草食动物中的代谢影响知之甚少。本研究旨在通过检测在动物园饲养的貘中添加菊粉后粪便代谢产物的差异，来描述其组成和相关代谢途径。
从 6 只成年貘的未处理组和处理组中采集粪便样本，并使用非靶向液相色谱-质谱联用方法进行分析。使用 KEGG 注释分析鉴定出的差异代谢物和涉及的代谢途径。
与对照组相比，粪便代谢产物和代谢途径发生了显著变化。与处理后相比，处理后时间延长，差异代谢物和代谢途径的数量趋于增加。我们发现色氨酸和嘌呤代谢与差异代谢物的重要代谢途径有关。
这些发现表明，菊粉可能在圈养野生动物中有潜在的应用价值，这可能为了解益生元补充对肠道代谢物的影响提供了新的思路，并强调了该领域的进一步研究。
