Fermented Cottonseed Meal as a Partial Replacement for Soybean Meal Could Improve the Growth Performance, Immunity and Antioxidant Properties, and Nutrient Digestibility by Altering the Gut Microbiota Profile of Weaned Piglets.

Xueling Gu,Zhiqing Li,Bie Tan,Jiashun Chen,Xiaokang Ma,Fan Zhang,Jing Wang,Nian Liu,Xiang Liu,Qian Jiang,Hao Li

doi:10.3389/fmicb.2021.734389

Abstract

The study investigated the impact of fermented cottonseed meal (FCSM) on growth performance, immunity and antioxidant properties, nutrient digestibility, and gut microbiota of weaned piglets by replacing soybean meal with FCSM in the diet. The experimental piglets were fed with either the soybean meal diet (SBM group) or fermented cottonseed meal diet (FCSM group) for 14days after weaning. The digestibility of dry matter (DM), organic matter (OM), crude protein (CP), gross energy (GE), amino acids and nitrogen was higher in the FCSM diet than those in the SBM diet (p<0.05). The piglets in the FCSM group showed greater growth performance and lower diarrhea rate than those in the SBM group (p<0.05). The concentration of serum immunoglobulin G (IgG) and antioxidase, intestinal and hepatic antioxidase were increased and the concentration of malondialdehyde (MDA) in the serum was decreased in those piglets in the FCSM group compared to those piglets in the SBM group (p<0.05). The piglets in the FCSM group had a higher concentration of volatile fatty acids (VFAs) in their ileum and cecum and a higher Simpson index of ileum than piglets in the SBM group (p<0.05). The relative abundance of Lactobacillus and [Ruminococcus]_torques_group in ileum and Intestinibacter, norank_f_Muribaculaceae, unclassified_o_Lactobacillales and [Eubacterium]_coprostanoligenes_group in cecum were enhanced in piglets fed with the FCSM diet, whereas the relative abundance of Sarcina and Terrisporobacter were increased in piglets fed with the SBM diet. Overall, FCSM replacing SBM improved the growth performance, immunity and antioxidant properties, and nutrient digestibility; possibly via the alterant gut microbiota and its metabolism of weaned piglets. Graphical Fermented cottonseed meal as a partial replacement for soybean meal could improve the growth performance, immunity and antioxidant properties, and nutrient digestibility by altering the gut microbiota profile of weaned piglets. SBM, soybean meal; FCSM, fermented cottonseed meal.

Highlights

Soybean meal (SBM), an important protein source in the livestock industry, is highly recognized for its significant protein content and widespread availability (Azarm and Lee, 2014; Kim, 2014)
It has been noticed that piglets in the Fermented cottonseed meal (FCSM) treatment had higher the final body weight (BW), average daily gain (ADG), and G:F (p < 0.05) and lower diarrhea incidence compared to those in the SBM treatment (p < 0.05; Table 3)
The results have shown that piglets in the FCSM group had higher serum immunoglobulin G (IgG) (p < 0.05) than those in the SBM group (Table 6)

Summary

Introduction

Soybean meal (SBM), an important protein source in the livestock industry, is highly recognized for its significant protein content and widespread availability (Azarm and Lee, 2014; Kim, 2014). The price of SBM has increased dramatically and the supply of high-quality protein feeding ingredients (such as SBM and fish meal) has been deficient in recent years. This leads to a higher livestock breeding expense and restricts the development of animal husbandry. Fermented cottonseed meal (FCSM), a product produced by mixing solid CSM with liquid phases and inoculating the mixture with beneficial microorganisms (Sun et al, 2014), can reduce free gossypol and improve the protein quality of CSM with solid state fermentation (Zhang et al, 2007). It has been suggested that the FCSM partial replacing SBM (about 6–8%) can improve the growth performance, immune and antioxidant capacity, and digestibility in broiler chickens (Sun et al, 2013; Nie et al, 2015; Wang et al, 2017; Niu et al, 2020), and can reduce the F:G (the ratio of feed and gain weight) and diarrhea rate in nursery pigs, growing pigs and finishing pigs (Guan et al, 2017), which indicated that the FCSM has the potential to be a high-quality protein source

Methods

Results

Conclusion