| Weaning is the key period during pig production. The intestinal immune system of piglets is not well developed at this stage. Great challenges, resulting from the separation with the sow, transferring to a new barn and the shift of diet from milk to feed., led to low feed digestibility, diarrhea and poor growth performance, which is called as "piglet early weaning syndrome". It is no doubt that antibiotics play an important role as growth promoters in preventing infection of diseases, improving growth performance, and increasing economic benefit. However, the increasing public concerns about antibiotics and human health draw extensive attention as the alternative feed additives. Recently, probiotics, prebiotics and synbiotics attract widespread concerns. Numerous studies are conducted to investigate the effect of probiotics, prebiotics and synbiotics on growth performance, the morphylogy of intestine and incidence of diarrhea of pigs. Lactobacillus plantarum (LP) and Lactobacillus casei (LC) are the probiotics that are most intensively investigated. The majority of researches focused on the effects of those two probiotics on piglets after weaning. The current study was conducted to investigate the effects of LP and LC on growth performance, diarrhea rate, organ weight, intestinal development and gut microbiota of piglets.1 Effects of Lactobacillus plantarum and Lactobacillus casei on growth performance, diarrhea rate, organ weight and intestinal development of pigletsThis study aims to investigate the effects of Lactobacillus plantarum and Lactobacillus casei on growth performance, diarrhea rate, organ weight and intestinal development of piglets. Fifteen litters of piglets were randomly allocated to 3 groups (control, LP group and LC group) at day 7 after birth. The trial was conducted for 28 days. On day 7,9,11,13,19,21 and 24, piglets were orally administrated with LP and LC. Water and feed were accessed ad libitum. The body weight was recorded at day 7,21,24 and 35.One piglet from each group was killed at day 21,24 and 35..The weight of liver, thymus, spleen, hindgut, foregut and stomach were measured, and the tissue samples of jejunum and ileum were collected. The results suggested that the administration of LP and LC improved the average daily gain and decreased F/G, but it was not statistical significance (P>0.05). Before weaning, the administrated group had no obvious effects on the diarrhea rate. However, the LC groups significantly decreased the diarrhea rate of piglets at the age of 24 and 35 days(P< 0.05). Both the two groups improved the organ index of liver, especially the LP group at postnatal 35 day. Both the two groups could improve the organ index of thymus and spleen during different period. Compared with LC group, the LP group had a heavier relative organ weight of gastrointestinal tract. Both LP and LC had no significant effect on jejunal and ileal villous height.2 Effects of Lactobacillus plantarum and Lactobacillus casei on the microbiota in intestinal of early post-weaning pigletsIn this study, effects of LP and LC on the composition and community of intestinal microbiota of the early post-weaning piglets was investigated. At day 7,9,11,13,19,21 and 24, pigs were fed with LP and LC. On day 21,24 and 35, one piglet from each group was weighed and slaughtered, the intestinal contents were collected for microbiota community analysis. PCR-DGGE showed that the LP and LC groups in post-weaning piglets increased the similarities of microbiota structure of the caecum. The LP and LC groups had no significant effects on the structure and diversity of microbiota in caecum before weaning. However, the diversity of microbiota in caecum decreased firstly and then increased both in LP and LC groups, along with arising some specific bands when compared with control after weaning. These results indicated that the LP and LC could increase the diversity of bacterial population in ileum and caecum of piglets.3 Effects of Lactobacillus plantarum and Lactobacillus casei alter the concentration of intestinal volatile fatty acids of post-weaning pigletsThe experiment aimed to investigate the effects of LP and LC administration on intestinal VFAs concentration of post-weaning piglets. On day 7,9,11,13,19,21 and 24, pigs were orally administrated of LP and LC. On day 7,21,24 and 35, piglets from each group were weighed. One piglet from each group was slaughtered at day 21,24 and 35. The jejunum, ileum, caecum and colon contents were collected. The result showed that the administration of LP and LC groups improved the intestinal VFAs concentration. Compared with control, LP group had no significant effect on acetate, propionate, butyrate and total VFAs concentration in jejunum, ileum, caecum before weaning, while LC increased acetate, propionate, butyrate and total VFAs concentration in jejunum, ileum, caecum and colon (P< 0.05). At 24d, LP and LC group had no effect on the VFAs in jejunum and ileum, while LP group significantly increased acetate concentration in colon (P< 0.05), and LC group increased acetate and total VFAs concentration in colon and acetate concentration in caecum (P< 0.05). After weaning, at 35d, LC groups increased acetate and total VFAs concentration in jejunum (P< 0.05). LP and LC groups increased the acetate and total VFAs concentration in ileum, caecum and colon. |
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