Effects of Maternal Factors and Postpartum Environment on Early Colonization of Intestinal Microbiota in Piglets

Abstract

Intestinal microbiota significantly influences the intake, storage, and utilization of body nutrients, as well as animal growth and development. The establishment of microbiota is affected by many factors, such as delivery and feeding modes, antibiotics, disease, and the surrounding environment. In this study, we selected Chinese indigenous Mashen and Jinfen White pigs as the study subjects. To explore the source and factors affecting the piglet intestinal microbiota, 16S rRNA gene sequencing was performed to analyze the microbial composition of the feces, saliva, vaginal secretions, and colostrum of parturient sows, feces and saliva of newborn piglets, and surrounding environment samples. The results showed that the microbiota of the saliva of sows and piglets is structurally similar to that of the environment and is dominated by the phylum Proteobacteria, including Acinetobacter, Actinomyces, and Pseudomonas. The core genus in the vaginal secretions and colostrum of sows was Pseudomonas. Among the fecal samples, the core bacterial genera in sows before and after delivery were Clostridium sensu_stricto_1 and Christensenellaceae_R-7_group, while in piglets at 1 d of age, Pseudomonas and Escherichia-Shigella were most abundant. These results indicate that microbiota in feces, colostrum, and vaginal secretions of sows more easily colonized piglet intestines through a symbiotic effect. The environmental and salivary microbiota could also affect the early colonization and succession of the intestinal microbiota of piglets to some extent. This study provides a theoretical basis for sow delivery protection and early nursing of piglets and background for the research and development of microbial agents to improve piglet intestinal health.

Bacterial profiles of the oral, vaginal, and rectal mucosa and colostrum of periparturient sows

“…Overall, around half of the top 20 genera were shared between the two studies. The composition in our study also overlapped with two other studies on sow oral microbiota where cotton swabs [24] or ropes [45] were used in sample collection, with eight of our 20 top genera shared with those of each of the studies. Acinetobacter was the dominant genus in both of these studies, Streptococcus was among the most abundant genera, but Rothia, Moraxella, and Actinobacillus were either less abundant or not detected.…”

“…Clostridium , Streptococcus , Staphylococcus , and Lactobacillus were identified as the most abundant genera in other studies [28, 72]. Pseudomonas was reported as the core genus by Li et al, with variation between the study breeds for the abundances of other genera [24].…”

“…Moderate differences between the farms were detected both in microbial diversity and RAs of the main genera in all the sample types. Although standard Finnish animal husbandry procedures were used on all the farms, many factors can contribute to differences in microbiota compositions, such as the genetic background of the sows [31, 32], details in feeding, [25, 26, 33], antibiotic use and stress [27, 34], and characteristics of the physical and microbial environment [35], especially during early life when the microbiota of the sows was first established ( [24, 28, 36, 37].…”

“…Due to the potential benefits of the microbiota on the health and performance of the host, there has been a growing interest in the composition of the commensal microbiota of production animals, including pigs. These studies have mostly focused on growing pigs [13,14], but the commensal microbiota of pregnant sows has also gained attention to an increasing extent [15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22][23][24]. Physiological factors, including phase of the reproduction cycle [16][17][18][19] and parity [21][22][23], can modulate the microbial compositions of the adult animals.…”

“…Environmental factors, such as diet, stress, and exposure to antibiotics [13,[25][26][27], can also have impacts. The fecal, vaginal, and colostrum (or milk) microbiotas of the sow in turn influence the developing microbiota and immune system of the offspring during pregnancy and lactation [6,22,24,28,29]. This has long-term effects on the health and growth of the piglets [6,30].…”