An official website of the United States government.
<OL> <LI> Identify physiological, immunological, endocrinological and
gastrointestinal-microbiological alterations which occur in infected livestock when
subjected to common managerial stressors.
<LI>Understand how handling and transportation stress influence livestock
pathogens, such as, Salmonella and Campylobacter, which have the potential to
detrimentally affect human health.
We will subject livestock to both mixing and transportation and collect behavioral,
physiologic, immunologic, endocrine, and bacterial data. The behavior data will
include: agonistic encounters, loss of balance, vomiting, standing, lying,
stereotypic behavior, and any other abnormal behaviors (i.e. shaking, jumping, etc).
<p>
The physiologic, immunologic, and endocrine data will include: heart rate, body
temperature, cortisol, epinephrine, norepinephrine, dopamine, immune cell
populations, interferon-gamma, interleukin-1, interleukin-12, haptoglobin, alpha 1-
acid glycoprotien, and immunoglobulins. The bacterial data will include: DGGE
pattern, total aerobes, anaerobes, Enterobacteriaceae counts, and the proportion of
antimicrobial resistant Enterobacteriaceae in different compartments of the
gastrointestinal tract and in mesenteric lymph nodes. Analysis of these collective
data will allow for identification of key processes that create high pathogen loads
at slaughter plants.
<p>
Our approach is a strategy that will 1) use a novel technique to monitor the
progression of infection of stressed swine, 2) study the influence of mammalian
stress hormones on bacteria, and 3) determine physiologically how a dietary
supplement can impair bacterial infection. All three of these approaches will
provide novel information on how stress influences bacterial pathogens.