Effects of Dietary Supplementation With Enterococcus faecium and Clostridium butyricum, Either Alone or in Combination, on Growth and Fecal Microbiota Composition of Post-weaning Pigs at a Commercial Farm

Abstract

Lactic acid bacteria (LAB) and butyric acid bacteria (BAB) are commonly used as probiotics in swine production. However, their combined effect on post-weaning pigs has not been assessed. Therefore, here we investigated the individual and combined efficacy of dietary Enterococcus faecium and Clostridium butyricum on the growth and gut microbiota of post-weaning pigs at a commercial farm. Four independent trials were conducted, in each of which five pens containing 10 pigs were assigned to one of five treatments: C, basal diet; L, basal diet + live E. faecium ; D, basal diet + heat-killed E. faecium ; M, basal diet + C. butyricum ; or L+M, basal diet + live E. faecium + C. butyricum . Each trial was conducted over a 90-day period that was divided into two phases (Phase 1, days 0–40 post-weaning; and Phase 2, days 40–90 post-weaning), with the probiotics being supplemented only during Phase 1. Ten pigs in each pen were used for body weight (BW) analysis and fecal samples were collected from five or six of these pigs. In addition, the fecal samples from one randomly selected trial were used for gut microbiota analysis. We found that pigs in the L, D, and L+M treatment groups had a significantly higher BW than those in C ( p < 0.05) but pigs in the L+M treatment group had a similar BW to those in the L and M groups. Furthermore, there were no significant differences in alpha diversity among the treatments but the beta diversity (weighted UniFrac distances) showed distinct clustering patterns, with pigs in C having discrete microbiota from those in all of the probiotics treatment groups except D (C vs. L, q = 0.04; C vs. M, q = 0.06; C vs. L+M, q = 0.06). These findings indicate that dietary supplementation with live or heat-killed E. faecium enhances growth performance in pigs but there is no synergistic effect when E. faecium is used in combination with C. butyricum . Furthermore, the addition of live E. faecium and C. butyricum to the diet of pigs may change the structure of the gut microbiota.

Dietary Clostridium butyricum supplementation modifies significantly the liver transcriptomic profile in weaned piglets

“…Clostridium butyricum is one of important probiotics used in animal production. Several studies have reported the health benefits of its administration (Chen et al, ; Sato et al, ; Takahashi et al, ), and the mechanisms of action of C. butyricum in swine and broilers include the regulation of the intestinal microecological balance (Zhang, Chen, et al, ; Zhang, Sun, et al, ), improving the intestinal barrier function (Chen et al, ), modulating immune responses (Li et al, ) and fat metabolism (Zhao, Guo, Guo, & Tan, ), improving the antioxidant capacity (Liao et al, ), which result in enhanced health and growth performance. However, no studies have investigated the liver transcriptome profile of swine fed with C. butyricum .…”

“…One such product is Clostridium butyricum ( C. butyricum ), which is known for its probiotic properties. Several studies have reported the nutritional and health functions of C. butyricum in piglets, and the mechanisms by which the specific bacterial stain contributes to the regulation of the intestinal microecological balance, improves intestinal barrier function, modulates immune responses and regulates fat metabolism (Chen et al, ; Liao et al, ; Sato et al, ; Takahashi et al, ; Zhang, Chen, et al, ; Zhang, Sun, et al, ). We previously found that C. butyricum supplementation exerted beneficial effects in improving intestinal integrity of weaned piglets, and these protective effects of C. butyricum on the intestine could be closely related to the reduced expression of intestinal proinflammatory cytokines via inhibition of the ASC‐independent NLRP3 inflammasome signalling pathway (Li, Li, Zhu, Qiao, & Wang, ).…”

Identification microflora related to growth performance in pigs based on 16s rRNA sequence analyses

“…Studies have shown that gut microbes are also involved in regulating animal growth. Xin et al found that Lactobacillus johnsonii BS15 could signi cantly improve the daily weight gain and diarrhea index of piglets, and improve the growth and development ability and disease resistance of piglets to a certain extent (Xin et al, 2020)., Yoshiaki et al found that adding Enterobacter faecalis to the diet of weaned piglets can effectively improve the growth performance of pigs, and adding Enterococcus faecalis and Clostridium butyrate to the diet may have certain effects on the change of intestinal ora structure (Yoshiaki et al, 2019). Niu et al (2019) found that the bacterial abundance of Clostridium and Turicibacter in sow intestines was positively correlated with the apparent digestibility of ether extract, Anaerofustis and Robinsoniella were positively correlated with the apparent digestibility of crude ber.…”

“…Collins bacterium (collinsella) and Sutterella abundance and neutral detergent ber (neutral detergent ber) of apparent digestibility were positively correlated. (Yang et al, 2019;Yoshiaki et al, 2019). Li et al (2019) used Yorkshire group to study the function of gut microbes found that gut microbes can improve nutrient digestibility of fattening pig growth and regulation of volatile fatty acids.…”

Identification microflora related to growth performance in pigs based on 16s rRNA sequence analyses

“…Studies have shown that gut microbes are also involved in regulating animal growth. Xin et al found that Lactobacillus johnsonii BS15 could signi cantly improve the daily weight gain and diarrhea index of piglets, and improve the growth and development ability and disease resistance of piglets to a certain extent (Xin et al, 2020)., Sato et al (2019) found that adding Enterobacter faecalis to the diet of weaned piglets can effectively improve the growth performance of pigs, and adding Enterococcus faecalis and Clostridium butyrate to the diet may have certain effects on the change of intestinal ora structure. Niu et al (2019) found that the bacterial abundance of Clostridium and Turicibacter in sow intestines was positively correlated with the apparent digestibility of ether extract, Anaerofustis and Robinsoniella were positively correlated with the apparent digestibility of crude ber.…”