MECHANISMS OF PREBIOTICS FOR PREVENTING EARLY-LIFE INTESTINAL HEALTH CHALLENGES IN SWINE

Our long-term goal is to understand the interplay between nutrition and gut health in order to address major early life intestinal health issues of swine. In preliminary studies, recovery of injured mucosa was impaired in suckling versus weanling pigs, and we have linked this to an underdeveloped component of the enteric nervous system, the enteric glial cell network. This has led us to investigate oligosaccharides, which we have shown alter the microbiome to induce maturation of enteric neural elements involved in gut barrier function. Our central hypothesis is that creep feeding oligosaccharides to suckling pigs will accelerate postnatal microbial colonization, thereby enhancing glial cell maturation and reducing inflammation to promote efficient intestinal barrier maintenance and repair in the peri-weaning period in response to the health challenges of ischemic injury (suckling piglets) or weaning stress (weanling pigs). Our specific objectives are: 1) Determine the ability of creep fed prebiotic oligosaccharides to accelerate postnatal microbial colonization, hasten the development of the EGC network, and enhance intestinal barrier function; 2) Determine if supplementation of creep fed prebiotic oligosaccharides hastens recovery of mucosal barrier function in ischemic-injured suckling intestine by stimulating EGC-regulated restitution; 3) Determine if supplementation of prebiotic oligosaccharides reduces the impact of weaning stress on mast cell infiltration, intestinal health, and growth performance.