Dietary taurine effect on intestinal barrier function, colonic microbiota and metabolites in weanling piglets induced by LPS

Dong-Dong Zhao; Ye-Dan Gai; Chen Li; Zi-Zheng Fu; De-Qi Yin; Mingxin Xie; Jing-Yuan Dai; Xin-Xin Wang; Yan-Xi Li; Gao-Feng Wu; Ying Feng; Jian-Min Hu; Shu-Mei Lin; Jian-Cheng Yang

doi:10.3389/fmicb.2023.1259133

Dietary taurine effect on intestinal barrier function, colonic microbiota and metabolites in weanling piglets induced by LPS

Front Microbiol. 2023 Dec 22:14:1259133. doi: 10.3389/fmicb.2023.1259133. eCollection 2023.

Authors

Affiliations

¹ Key Laboratory of Zoonosis of Liaoning Province, College of Animal Science and Veterinary Medicine, Shenyang Agricultural University, Shenyang, China.
² Animal Science and Technology College, Beijing University of Agriculture, Beijing, China.
³ Animal Husbandry and Veterinary College, Jiangsu Vocational College of Agriculture and Forestry, Zhenjiang, China.

^# Contributed equally.

Abstract

Diarrhea in piglets is one of the most important diseases and a significant cause of death in piglets. Preliminary studies have confirmed that taurine reduces the rate and index of diarrhea in piglets induced by LPS. However, there is still a lack of relevant information on the specific target and mechanism of action of taurine. Therefore, we investigated the effects of taurine on the growth and barrier functions of the intestine, microbiota composition, and metabolite composition of piglets induced by LPS. Eighteen male weaned piglets were randomly divided into the CON group (basal diet + standard saline injection), LPS group (basal diet + LPS-intraperitoneal injection), and TAU + LPS group (basal diet + 0.3% taurine + LPS-intraperitoneal injection). The results show that taurine significantly increased the ADG and decreased the F/G (p < 0.05) compared with the group of CON. The group of TAU + LPS significantly improved colonic villous damage (p < 0.05). The expression of ZO-1, Occludin and Claudin-1 genes and proteins were markedly up-regulated (p < 0.05). Based on 16s rRNA sequencing analysis, the relative abundance of Lactobacilluscae and Firmicutes in the colon was significantly higher in the LPS + TAU group compared to the LPS group (p < 0.05). Four metabolites were significantly higher and one metabolite was significantly lower in the TAU + LPS group compared to the LPS group (p < 0.01). The above results show that LPS disrupts intestinal microorganisms and metabolites in weaned piglets and affects intestinal barrier function. Preventive addition of taurine enhances beneficial microbiota, modulates intestinal metabolites, and strengthens the intestinal mechanical barrier. Therefore, taurine can be used as a feed additive to prevent intestinal damage by regulating intestinal microorganisms and metabolites.

Keywords: mechanical barrier; metabolites; microbiota; taurine; weaned piglet.

Grants and funding

The authors declare that financial support was received for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article. This work was funded by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Nos. 31872440 and 32172813).