20 Vaginal microbiome composition is associated with sow longevity

Abstract

Abstract The vaginal microbiome of gilts vaccinated for porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome (PRRS) has been previously associated with first-parity reproductive performance in absence of PRRS outbreak. However, associations using multiparous sows have not been investigated. The objective of this study was to associate the vaginal microbiota of PRRS-vaccinated gilts with longevity. Vaginal swabs from 251 commercial F1 gilts (Landrace/Large-White) were collected on days 4 and 52 after PRRS vaccination (dpv) for 16S rRNA sequencing. Sequences were clustered into operational taxonomic unit (OTU). Sows were assigned to one of four groups according to the maximum parity reached (number of animals): without parity (13), first-parity (45), second-parity (47), and 3 or more parities (146). A negative binomial mixed model including fixed effects of group, dpv, group*dpv, and collection age (covariate), and random effect of animal, was used to identify OTUs with differential abundance. The false discovery rate method was used for multiple test correction. Canonical discriminant analysis (CDA) was performed to classify animals into the four parity groups by including significant OTUs in stepwise selection (P < 0.05) using the whole data. A leave-one-out-cross-validation was used to assess the predictive ability of OTUs to correctly classify animals into the parity groups. Abundance of five and four OTUs was associated (q < 0.05) with group and with group*dpv (q < 0.05), respectively. In the CDA analysis, 220 OTUs identified in the vaginal microbiome were included (P < 0.05). The first and second canonical variables explained 96.6 and 3.4% of the variation, respectively. All animals were correctly classified into their respective parity groups. This study indicates that the vaginal microbiome composition of gilts collected after PRRS-vaccination may be used to predict longevity in commercial sow herds. This study was financed in part by the Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior – Brazil (Capes) – Finance Code 001.