Li Meng, Abouelfetouh Mahmoud M, Salah Eman, Kiani Faisal Ayub, Nan Sha, Ding Mingxing, Ding Yi
College of Veterinary Medicine, Huazhong Agricultural University, Wuhan, China.
Henan Jinlu Special Breeding Farm, Zhengzhou, China.
Front Vet Sci. 2024 Sep 23;11:1432269. doi: 10.3389/fvets.2024.1432269. eCollection 2024.
Enteritis and dysbiosis are the major causes of high morbidity and mortality of juvenile ostriches. Chicory (CC) has been proven to have excellent antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, and antibacterial activities. However, it's unclear whether CC could improve the survival rate of juvenile ostriches by relieving enteritis and correcting dysbiosis.
South African ostrich hatchlings () were fed with and without a CC-supplemented diet, and the body weight gain and mortality were compared over 4 months of age. Fresh fecal samples of clinically healthy ostriches were collected, and 16S DNAs were analyzed. Moreover, ostrich chicks with LPS-induced enteritis were fed with different dosages (0, 20, 40, and 80 mg/kg) of chicoric acid (CA), a major bioactive component of CC, for five consecutive days. The expression levels of tight junction (TJ)-related proteins and inflammatory mediators in the ilea were detected with western blot and immunofluorescence.
The ostrich chicks fed on the CC-supplemented diet began to increase in weight at the 1st month of age and became remarkably heavier at the fourth month ( < 0.01) compared with those fed on the non-CC-supplemented diet. Additionally, the mortality percentage was lower in the chicks fed on the CC-supplemented diet than those fed on the non-CC-supplemented diet (19% vs. 36%, respectively). The diet with the CC supplementation significantly increased the abundance of (linear discriminant analysis; LDA >4) and (26.7% vs. 17.7%, respectively) as well as decreased the enrichment of (5.0% vs. 9.1%, respectively) in the ostrich ilea compared to the diet without CC. The supplementation of CA at a dose of 80 mg/kg significantly increased the expression level of ZO-1 and claudin-3 ( < 0.0001) and suppressed the levels of IL-1β, IL-6, and TNF-α ( < 0.0001) in ostriches with LPS-induced ileitis.
Our results substantiate that CC or CA supplementation in a diet could effectively improve growth performance and reduce mortality in juvenile ostriches via modulating the gut microbiota and attenuating enteritis.
肠炎和肠道菌群失调是幼年鸵鸟高发病率和高死亡率的主要原因。菊苣（CC）已被证明具有出色的抗氧化、抗炎和抗菌活性。然而，尚不清楚CC是否可以通过缓解肠炎和纠正肠道菌群失调来提高幼年鸵鸟的存活率。
将南非鸵鸟幼雏（）分别喂食添加和不添加CC的日粮，并比较4个月龄内的体重增加和死亡率。收集临床健康鸵鸟的新鲜粪便样本，并分析16S DNA。此外，将脂多糖诱导肠炎的鸵鸟雏鸡连续五天喂食不同剂量（0、20、40和80 mg/kg）的菊苣酸（CA），CA是CC的主要生物活性成分。用蛋白质免疫印迹法和免疫荧光法检测回肠中紧密连接（TJ）相关蛋白和炎症介质的表达水平。
与喂食未添加CC日粮的鸵鸟雏鸡相比，喂食添加CC日粮的鸵鸟雏鸡在1月龄时开始体重增加，在4月龄时体重显著增加（<0.01）。此外，喂食添加CC日粮的雏鸡死亡率低于喂食未添加CC日粮的雏鸡（分别为19%和36%）。与未添加CC的日粮相比，添加CC的日粮显著增加了鸵鸟回肠中（线性判别分析；LDA>4）和（分别为26.7%和17.7%）的丰度，并降低了（分别为5.0%和9.1%）的富集。在脂多糖诱导回肠炎的鸵鸟中，80 mg/kg剂量的CA补充剂显著提高了ZO-1和claudin-3的表达水平（<0.0001），并抑制了IL-1β、IL-6和TNF-α的水平（<0.0001）。
我们的结果证实，日粮中添加CC或CA可通过调节肠道微生物群和减轻肠炎有效提高幼年鸵鸟的生长性能并降低死亡率。
