Project description:An experiment was conducted to investigate the effects of dietary inclusion of rye, a model ingredient to increase gut viscosity, between 14 and 28 days of age on immune competence related parameters and performance of broiler. A total number of 960 one-day-old male Ross 308 chicks were weighed and randomly allocated to 24 pens (40 birds per pen), and the birds in every 8 replicate pens were assigned to one of three experimental diets including graded levels, 0%, 5%, and 10% of rye. Tested immune competence related parameters were composition of the intestinal microbiota, genes expression in gut tissue, and gut morphology. The inclusion of 5% or 10% rye in the diet (d14-28) resulted in decreased performance and litter quality, but in increased villus height and crypt depth in the small intestine (jejunum) of the broilers. Relative bursa and spleen weights were not affected by dietary inclusion of rye. In the jejunum, no effects on number and size of goblet cells, and only trends on microbiota composition in the digesta were observed. Dietary inclusion of rye affected expression of genes involved in cell cycle processes of the jejunal enterocyte cells, thereby influencing cell growth, cell differentiation and cell survival, which in turn were consistent with the observed differences in the morphology of the gut wall. In addition, providing rye-rich diets to broilers affected the complement and coagulation pathways, which are parts of the innate immune system. These pathways are involved in eradicating invasive pathogens. Overall, it can be concluded that inclusion of 5% or 10% rye to the grower diet of broilers had limited effects on performance. Ileal gut morphology, microbiota composition of jejunal digesta, and gene expression profiles of jejunal tissue, however, were affected by dietary rye inclusion level, indicating that rye supplementation to broiler diets might affect immune competence of the birds.
Project description:We recently performed global gene expression in the breast muscles of modern broiler and foundation line chickens. In this study, we have peformed miRNA expression analyses in the same tissues to identify muscle specific miRNAs that could be regulatory factors for muscle growth and feed efficiency in chickens.
Project description:Gut microbiome research is rapidly moving towards the functional characterization of the microbiota by means of shotgun meta-omics. Here, we selected a cohort of healthy subjects from an indigenous and monitored Sardinian population to analyze their gut microbiota using both shotgun metagenomics and shotgun metaproteomics. We found a considerable divergence between genetic potential and functional activity of the human healthy gut microbiota, in spite of a quite comparable taxonomic structure revealed by the two approaches. Investigation of inter-individual variability of taxonomic features revealed Bacteroides and Akkermansia as remarkably conserved and variable in abundance within the population, respectively. Firmicutes-driven butyrogenesis (mainly due to Faecalibacterium spp.) was shown to be the functional activity with the higher expression rate and the lower inter-individual variability in the study cohort, highlighting the key importance of the biosynthesis of this microbial by-product for the gut homeostasis. The taxon-specific contribution to functional activities and metabolic tasks was also examined, giving insights into the peculiar role of several gut microbiota members in carbohydrate metabolism (including polysaccharide degradation, glycan transport, glycolysis and short-chain fatty acid production). In conclusion, our results provide useful indications regarding the main functions actively exerted by the gut microbiota members of a healthy human cohort, and support metaproteomics as a valuable approach to investigate the functional role of the gut microbiota in health and disease.
Project description:The main goal of the project is the study the associations between the gut metagenome and human health. The dataset contains data for n=7211 FINRISK 2002 participants who underwent fecal sampling. Demultiplexed shallow shotgun metagenomic sequences were quality filtered and adapter trimmed using Atropos (Didion et al., 2017), and human filtered using Bowtie2 (Langmead and Salzberg, 2012).
Project description:The main goal of the project is the study the associations between the gut metagenome and human health. The dataset contains data for n=7211 FINRISK 2002 participants who underwent fecal sampling. Demultiplexed shallow shotgun metagenomic sequences were quality filtered and adapter trimmed using Atropos (Didion et al., 2017), and human filtered using Bowtie2 (Langmead and Salzberg, 2012).
Project description:To provide insight into the systemic metabolic effects of S. enteritidis infection, liver samples were harvested 10 days post infection from broiler hens. Hepatic global gene expression levels were assessed using a chicken 44K Agilent microarray. Forty-four genes were differentially expressed at a significance level of q-value < 0.05. One hundred eighty-three genes were differentially expressed at a suggestive significance level of q-value < 0.1. A predominance of down-regulation existed among significantly differentially expressed genes. A cell morphology, cell cycle, organismal injury and abnormalities network and a metabolic disease, cardiovascular system development and function, and urological disease network were created from the differentially expressed genes. Apoptosis, electron transport, peptidase activity, vein constriction, cell differentiation, IL-2 signaling, Jak-Stat signaling, B-cell receptor signaling, GDP/GTP exchange, and cytokine suppression were among the functions of the differentially expressed genes that were down-regulated in response to S. enteritidis. The effects of S. enteritidis infection on the liver transcriptome profiles of broilers reflect a predominance of down-regulation of genes involved with metabolic, cell morphology, cell cycle, urological disease, and organismal injury functions. These results provide insight into important systemic metabolic mechanisms that are active in the chicken liver in response to S. enteritidis infection. Sixteen broiler hens of approximately 5 months (8 challenged orally with 1x108 S. enteritidis on each of three sequential days and 8 mock-challenged with phosphate buffered saline) were used. Livers were harvested at 10 days post infection and stored in RNALater (Ambion).
Project description:Abstract: Ammonia is one of the most prominent air pollutants in poultry houses. High levels of ammonia have adverse effects on respiratory health, growth performance, meat production of broilers, and breast meat growth and yield are critical important in the broiler industry. To date, studies focus on the negative relationship of ammonia exposure and breast muscle tissue are still very limited, and the underlying molecular mechanisms remain poorly understood. In this study, high concentrations of atmospheric ammonia were found to lower slaughter rate and broiler breast meat yield significantly (P < 0.05). To explore the candidate genes that ammonia regulates breast meat yield of broilers, high throughout RNA-Seq was used to compare the transcriptome of breast muscle with different ammonia exposure (50 ppm vs 3 ppm). In total, 129 differentially expressed genes (DEGs) were identified (P-value < 0.05; fold-change ≥ 2), among which 87 genes were significantly down-regulated and 42 were up-regulated. Bioinformatics analysis suggested that DEGs (such as PDK4, ACSL1, GLUL, FBXO32) were involved in fatty acid degradation/metabolism, nitrogen metabolism, PPAR signaling and adipocytokine signaling pathways. Functional annotation showed that DEGs were mainly enriched in reactive oxygen species metabolic process and muscle contraction. It can be concluded that decreased meat yield was due to the DEGs participating in above biological processes and pathways. This study provides novel insights into transcriptional differences in breast meat between high- and low-ammonia exposed broiler chickens.