Procyanidins regulate colonic metabolome, inflammatory response and antioxidant capacity in lambs fed a high-concentrate diet.

This study explored the mechanism by which grape seed procyanidins (GSPs) alleviate colon inflammatory injury induced by a high-concentrate diet in lambs. Forty-eight 1/2 Dorper (♂) × 1/2 Small thin-tailed (♀) crossed male lambs were randomly assigned into four groups: the control group (CON), fed with a high-concentrate diet (concentrate:forage = 7:3) and three GSPs groups fed a high-concentrate diet + 10 (LGSP), 20 (MGSP) and 40 (HGSP) mg/kg body weight (BW) GSPs per day, respectively. The results showed that the levels of interleukin (IL)-1ß and tumour necrosis factor (TNF)-α in plasma of lambs of the MGSP (0.155 and 38.52 pg/ml) and HGSP (0.165 and 39.60 pg/ml) groups were significantly lower than those in the CON (0.248 and 48.74 pg/ml) and LGSP (0.245 and 50.52 pg/ml) group (p < 0.05), and levels of IL-1ß in colon tissue in the MGSP (28.49 ng/g) and HGSP (26.67 ng/g) groups were also lower (p < 0.05) than that in CON (40.55 ng/g). Metabonomics analysis of colon tissue showed that differentially expressed metabolites were mainly enriched in the arachidonic acid metabolism, citric acid cycle, glycine, serine and threonine metabolism, and peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor signalling pathway (p < 0.05). In conclusion, GSPs alleviate the colonic epithelium inflammatory response induced by a high-concentrate diet by increasing energy metabolism, amino acid metabolism, antioxidant metabolism and inhibiting arachidonic acid metabolism.

Nutrient digestibility, rumen microbial protein synthesis, and growth performance in sheep consuming rations containing sea buckthorn pomace.

This experiment was conducted to investigate nutrient digestibility, rumen microbial protein synthesis, and growth performance when different proportions of sea buckthorn pomace (SBP) were included in the diet of sheep. A total of forty1/2 Dorper × 1/2 thin-tailed Han ram lambs (BW = 22.2 ± 0.92 kg, age =120 ± 11 d; mean ± SD) were selected and divided into four groups in a randomized design and were randomly allocated to one of four treatment diets. Diets were formulated isonitrogenously and contained different levels of SBP: 1) 0% SBP (control), 2) 7.8% of DM SBP (8SBP), 3) 16.0% of DM SBP (16SBP), and 4) 23.5% of DM SBP (24SBP). A portion of corn and forages were replaced with SBP. DMI and ADG increased linearly (P = 0.001), but feed efficiency was not affected (P ≥ 0.460) by increasing SBP inclusion rate. As the SBP inclusion increased, OM, NDF, and ADF digestibility decreased linearly (P ≤ 0.005) and that CP increased linearly (P = 0.012). Response to inclusion level of SBP was quadratic (P = 0.003) for the estimated microbial CP yield with the greatest at intermediate SBP levels. For intestinally absorbable dietary protein, quadratic (P = 0.029) effects were observed among treatments. The metabolizable protein (MP) supplies were linearly (P < 0.0001) improved with increasing SBP inclusion rate. The results indicated that SBP can be incorporated in the ration of ram lambs and improve MP supply and ADG. However, high content of it in the diet was adverse for nutrient digestibility. The optimal proportion was 16.0% under the condition of this experiment.