Acta Veterinaria et Zootechnica Sinica ›› 2023, Vol. 54 ›› Issue (1): 213-226.doi: 10.11843/j.issn.0366-6964.2023.01.020

• ANIMAL NUTRITION AND FEEDS • Previous Articles     Next Articles

Identification of Gut Microbial Taxa Associated with Feeding Behaviors in Pigs

JIANG Hui, YANG Hui, FANG Shaoming, GAO Jun*, CHEN Congying*   

  1. State Key Laboratory of Pig Genetic Improvement and Production Technology, Jiangxi Agricultural University, Nanchang 330045, China
  • Received:2022-04-12 Online:2023-01-23 Published:2023-01-17

Abstract: Animals acquire energy and nutrients mainly by feed intake. Exploring the effect of gut microbiota on pig feeding behaviors and investigating its potential mechanism would provide theoretical basis for improving pig feeding behaviors through regulating gut microbiota. A total of 210 commercial Duroc pigs were used in this study. Phenotypes relating to feeding behaviors, including average daily eating time (ADET), average daily eating visits (ADEV) and average daily feed intake (ADFI) were recorded by automatic feeders. Stool samples were collected from the anus at the age of 140 days, and the structure and composition of gut microbiota were obtained by sequencing V3-V4 region of 16S rRNA gene. The Two-part model and co-abundance groups (CAGs) were used to identify the gut microbial taxa associated with feeding behaviors of pigs. The results showed as follows: 1) Correlation analysis between phenotypes showed that ADET was significantly and positively correlated with ADEV (r=0.41, P<0.05) and RFI(r=0.32, P<0.05); ADFI was significantly and positively correlated with RFI (r=0.56, P<0.05) and average daily gain (ADG) (r=0.63, P<0.05). In addition, RFI was significantly positively correlated with backfat thickness (r=0.16, P<0.05). 2) In CAGs analysis, a significant negative correlation was found between CAG2 and ADFI (P<0.05). This CAG mainly included OTUs annotated to Ruminococcaceae, Bacteroidales and Oscillospira, etc. However, CAG9 containing OTUs annotated to Faecalibacterium prausnitzii, Eubacterium biforme and Asteroleplasma anaerobium was significantly and positively correlated with ADFI (P<0.05). 3) In the correlation analysis, there was no OTU that was identified to be significantly associated with feeding behaviors at FDR<0.05. However, 14, 21 and 25 OTUs were identified to showing a tendency of association with ADET, ADEV and ADFI, respectively (P<0.01). Among them, OTUs showing positive correlations with the ADFI were mainly annotated to Prevotella, Ruminococcaceae and Erysipelotrichaceae, etc, while those OTUs having negative correlation were annotated to YRC22, Burkholderiales, Lachnospiraceae and Ruminococcaceae. 4) The functional prediction analysis of the gut microbiota showed that there was a significantly positive correlation between ADFI and biological funtions including Insulin signaling pathway and Lipid metabolism. Whereas the Sphingolipid metabolism was significantly and negatively correlated with ADFI (P<0.05). The results of this study suggest that some bacteria which can produce short-chain fatty acids or lactic acid, such as Burkholderiales, Ruminococcaceae, Christensenellaceae, Lachnospiraceae, etc., may play an important role in inhibiting feed intake, while Prevotella, especially Prevotella copri has the potential effect enhancing host appetite, are the key microorganisms that regulating the host feeding behaviour.

Key words: pig, feeding behavior, 16S rRNA, gut microbiota, feces, co-abundance groups

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