Abstract
Antioxidant polyphenols from plants are potential dietary supplementation to alleviate early weaning-induced intestinal disorders in piglets. Recent evidences showed polyphenol quercetin could reshape gut microbiota when it functioned as anti-inflammation or antioxidation agents in rodent models. However, the effect of dietary quercetin supplementation on intestinal disorders and gut microbiota of weanling piglets, along with the role of gut microbiota in this effect, both remain unclear. Here, we determined the quercetin's effect on attenuating diarrhea, intestinal damage, and redox imbalance, as well as the role of gut microbiota by transferring the quercetin-treated fecal microbiota to the recipient piglets. The results showed that dietary quercetin supplementation decreased piglets' fecal scores improved intestinal damage by increasing tight junction protein occludin, villus height, and villus height/crypt depth ratio but decreased crypt depth and intestinal epithelial apoptosis (TUNEL staining). Quercetin also increased antioxidant capacity indices, including total antioxidant capacity, catalase, and glutathione/oxidized glutathione disulfide but decreased oxidative metabolite malondialdehyde in the jejunum tissue. Fecal microbiota transplantation (FMT) from quercetin-treated piglets had comparable effects on improving intestinal damage and antioxidative capacity than dietary quercetin supplementation. Further analysis of gut microbiota using 16S rDNA sequencing showed that dietary quercetin supplementation or FMT shifted the structure and increased the diversity of gut microbiota. Especially, anaerobic trait and carbohydrate metabolism functions of gut microbiota were enriched after dietary quercetin supplementation and FMT, which may owe to the increased antioxidative capacity of intestine. Quercetin increased the relative abundances of Fibrobacteres, Akkermansia muciniphila, Clostridium butyricum, Clostridium celatum, and Prevotella copri but decreased the relative abundances of Proteobacteria, Lactobacillus coleohominis, and Ruminococcus bromii. Besides, quercetin-shifted bacteria and carbohydrate metabolites short chain fatty acids were significantly related to the indices of antioxidant capacity and intestinal integrity. Overall, dietary quercetin supplementation attenuated diarrhea and intestinal damage by enhancing the antioxidant capacity and regulating gut microbial structure and metabolism in piglets.
Highlights
Weaning is a critical strategy for improving the efficiency of modern swine breeding system but usually results in physiological, environmental, and social stress for piglets [1]
QT and from QT group every other day (FQT) had no significant effect on NO in the jejunum tissue (Figure 1(g)). These results suggested that dietary quercetin supplementation and Fecal microbiota transplantation (FMT) attenuated diarrhea, intestinal barrier function, and redox imbalance in weanling piglets
(Figure 2(e)) of the jejunum tissue. These results suggested that dietary quercetin supplementation and FMT improved
Summary
Weaning is a critical strategy for improving the efficiency of modern swine breeding system but usually results in physiological, environmental, and social stress for piglets [1]. These stresses occur during the initial postweaning period, which is frequently characterized by transient anorexia, gut microbiota dysbiosis, severe intestinal damage, infections, and diarrhea, compromising the antidisease’s ability of young piglets [2, 3]. The disturbed gastrointestinal functionality during the first two weeks triggers oxidative stress, which, characterized by an imbalance between the production of free radicals and the scavenging ability of the antioxidant defense system, has been involved in the initiation and pathogenesis of early weaning-induced intestinal disorders [1, 4, 5]. The causality between gut microbiota and quercetin’s antioxidative function is unclear
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