Supplementation of Diets With Bovine Colostrum Influences Immune and Gut Function in Kittens

Autor: Asa M. Gore, Ebenezer Satyaraj, Jeff Labuda, Robyn Engler, Peichuan Sun, Wendell Kerr, Lisa Conboy-Schmidt
Jazyk: angličtina
Rok vydání: 2021
Předmět:
Zdroj: Frontiers in Veterinary Science, Vol 8 (2021)
Druh dokumentu: article
ISSN: 2297-1769
DOI: 10.3389/fvets.2021.675712
Popis: In its early life a kitten faces many significant events including separation from its mother, re-homing and vaccination. The kitten is also slowly adapting to their post-weaning diet. Recent advances in companion animal nutrition have indicated that functional ingredients such as colostrum can help support the immune system and gastrointestinal health. Here we report for the first time the effect of feeding a diet containing 0.1% spray dried bovine colostrum (BC) to growing kittens on gut-associated lymphoid (GALT) tissue responses, systemic immune responses, and on intestinal microbiota stability. BC supplementation induced increased faecal IgA expression, and a faster and stronger antibody response to a rabies vaccine booster, indicative of better localised and systemic immune function, respectively. BC supplementation also helped to maintain kittens' intestinal microbiota stability in the face of a mildly challenging life event. These results show that BC supplementation can help strengthen the immune system and enhance the gut microbiota stability of growing kittens.
Databáze: Directory of Open Access Journals