Swine Nutrition Research Update – 2020 Badger Swine Symposium

Young Dal Jang  00:03

Hi everyone.  My name is Dr. Young Dal Jang, who is an assistant professor in Department of Animal and Food Science at UW-RF. My major emphasis is swine nutrition. And I’m glad to meet with you even though it is a pre-recorded presentation, and I hope you are enjoying this presentation, and Badger Swine Symposium. Today my topic is about UW-RF swine nutrition research updates. I am conducting several swine nutrition researchers at UW-RF with undergraduate students.

Young Dal Jang  00:39

And I would like to introduce my research, research and future researchers coming up to you. So I will show you the effect of fat-soluble vitamin injection to weaning pigs and its distribution in the body. And then I will introduce my future research about the effect of secondary iron injection to pre-weaning pigs.  Let’s get started.

Young Dal Jang  01:06

So fat-soluble vitamins are a very important micronutrient for pigs. There are four fat-soluble vitamins which are vitamin A, D, E, and K. Vitamin A is important for vision and reproduction.

Young Dal Jang  01:24

Vitamin D is important for calcium and phosphorus absorption and homeostasis in the body and has an important function in the immunity.

Young Dal Jang  01:34

Vitamin in vitamin E is a natural antioxidant, which has an important role in protecting body cells from oxidative stress and their stress and thereby reproduction.

Young Dal Jang  01:48

Vitamin K is important in blood clotting.  Even though these vitamins usually have no impact on growth performance, if these vitamins are deficient, peaks will show some deficiency symptoms.

Young Dal Jang  02:06

Vitamin K has usually no effect other than blood clotting. So I will focus on vitamin A, D and E. So this slide shows you the blood fat-soluble vitamins titers of piglets by age. Graph A is for vitamin D, graph B is for vitamin E. Graph C is for vitamin A status.

Young Dal Jang  02:35

X axis for our graph is the piglets age after birth. And these are these vitamins are measured in their suckling period until day 21 of age.

Young Dal Jang  02:53

At first at birth to about the first few days, vitamin D is increased.  And reach its peak and then constant until weaned.  Vitamin E status increased in the first few days and then decreased until day ten of age and then about constant. Vitamin A, which is retinol concentration, does not change a lot over time. But retinyl palmitate concentration in the blood, decreased after birth.

Young Dal Jang  03:45

An increase of these three vitamin status in the first few days results from colostrum intake, but milk contains low amounts of these fat soluble vitamins. So if there is no additional supply of these vitamins to the pigs, their status will decrease. Which means additional supplementation or administration will be beneficial for piglets.

Young Dal Jang  04:15

So then, how can we enhance pigs fat-soluble vitamin status? We can provide these vitamins to the pigs through drinking water, feed, or administration etc. But my previous study showed that one-time intramuscular injection would increase plasma fat-soluble vitamin status about twice more effectively than oral administration, which means an intramuscular injection of these vitamins is more effective than an oral administration and the other method. So because there is no need of absorption process in GI tract if they are injected so it will be more effective. Then there was a question about where these injected vitamins go in the body. So this means where the body needs these vitamins.

Young Dal Jang  05:14

Then I conducted a research to investigate distribution of injected fat-soluble vitamins in nursery pigs. So I use the 16 newly weaned piglets and they were allotted to two treatments at day seven after weaning to ensure they’re they have good health condition after weaning.

Young Dal Jang  05:38

Then control pigs didn’t have any vitamin injection and EAD treatment. So EAD pigs received intramuscular injection of 900 IU of vitamin E, d-alpha-tocopherol and 300,000 IU of retinyl palmitate, which is a main storage form of vitamin A in the body, and 30,000 IU of vitamin D3, which is a vitamin D form used in animal body. And our pigs were fed a common corn-soybean meal basal diet with vitamin A.

Young Dal Jang  06:22

Then blood samples were taken at day zero as an initial before injection. Day three, day seven and then day 14 post-injection. Tissue samples were taken at the seven and 14 day post-injection. Liver, brain, muscle, lung, and heart samples were taken from pigs to measure the fat-soluble vitamin concentrations in those tissues.

Young Dal Jang  06:51

Retinyl palmitate and retinol concentrations were analyzed for vitamin A status. And alpha-tocopherol concentrations were analyzed for vitamin A, and E status, and then 25 hydroxy d3 concentration were analyzed only in plasma because our focus was in vitamin A and E.

Young Dal Jang  07:16

Now here are the data. Firstly, about plasma fat soluble vitamin status. When I injected these three vitamins, plasma level of vitamin D3, on the left side graph, and vitamin E, alpha-tocopherol concentration, in plasma significantly increased at day three, seven and then day 14 for vitamin D.

Young Dal Jang  07:50

And this graph shows you vitamin A status with retinol concentrations in plasma, even though liver controls retinol concentration in the body fairly strictly, retinyl palmitate injection, which is a vitamin A source, increased retinol concentration at day three, seven, and 14 post-injection. So these results mean that the fat soluble vitamin injection vitamin A, D, and E could increase plasma status of these vitamins in pigs.

Young Dal Jang  08:26

So now I measured vitamin A and E parameters in several tissues. This slide shows you the retinol and retinyl palmitate concentrations in the liver. Retinol is a circulating form of vitamin A in the body and retinyl palmitate is a stronger form of vitamin A in the body. The most of vitamin A in the body is stored in the liver. That is why I analyzed liver vitamin A concentrations. In both graphs for retinol and retinyl palmitate, showed a significant increase in the liver, day seven and day 14 and day seven and day 14. So vitamin A injection increased liver vitamin A concentrations. I also analyzed these parameters in the other tissues I collected, but there were or they were at or below the detection limit. So, which means, the concentration of these vitamin A parameters in the other tissues are very small. So injected vitamin A will go to mostly go to the liver, which is the most important organ for vitamin A metabolism, but not the other tissues.

Young Dal Jang  10:02

And this slide shows you the alpha-tocopherol concentration, which is vitamin E status in different tissues. Since alpha-tocopherol was detected in all these tissues I collected, I have all those graphs here in this slide. The top left, the graph is for liver, the right one is for muscle, bottom left graph is for heart. And this right one is for brain.

Young Dal Jang  10:38

Alpha-tocopherol concentrations increased in the liver, here, muscle here and heart at day 7 and 14 post-injection with our vitamin E injection, but there were no differences in brain and lung, alpha-tocopherol concentrations. Since alpha-tocopherol was detected and increased in these tissues after injection, vitamin E is needed in the body for many organs.

Young Dal Jang  11:21

So vitamin E is needed for different organs. It would be true because vitamin E is an antioxidant that protects cells from oxidative damage. No difference in brain means that brains still need vitamin E, as it was detected, but it has a different mechanism to accumulate the injected vitamin E in the brain.

Young Dal Jang  11:55

So. summary of this study is that fat-soluble vitamin injection could increase their vitamin status in the pig’s body and vitamin A is needed in the liver and vitamin E is needed for all body tissues.

Young Dal Jang  12:11

So now we could know these fat-soluble vitamins are very important to ensure pigs health and and their normal body functions.

Young Dal Jang  12:26

Okay, now, let me introduce my research coming up. I will conduct two research [projects] soon. They are more applied research that may help our swine producers. We all know baby piglets need iron injection around birth because they don’t have enough iron reserve in the body at birth. Milk has low iron content. And they are growing so fast. So that they need iron to synthesize hemoglobin for enough oxygen transport for their metabolism and growth. So we usually inject about 150 to 200 milligram of iron when they are born. Then my question was is that, is it sufficient to cover our 21 to 28 days of suckling period? Will they need more iron before weaning to maximize pre-weaning growth and increase weaning weight that may result in higher post weaning growth?

Young Dal Jang  13:41

So if you look at this graph, that this is from University of Kentucky group, they injected different level[s] of iron at birth and measured hematocrit percentage which represent the red blood cells in the body in the blood.

Young Dal Jang  14:13

So no injection, here’s zero, this blue line. No injection definitely reduced this hematocrit content, okay. And then 100 and 200 milligrams which is [the] green line, and then the purple line showed there was an increase of hematocrit percentage. But in 100 milligram of iron injection, there is a decline of hematocrit from a week after injection. So this means one time iron injection may not be enough to cover the 21 to 28 days of suckling period and a second iron injection to the pigs in the middle of this circled period may help to increase these hematocrit status of pigs. So, two studies will be conducted at UW-RF soon, the first one with discussion. A secondary iron injection before weaning would be necessary to ensure their performance after weaning and pre-weaning period.

Young Dal Jang  15:34

The second study with this question, if secondary iron injection is effective, this would be more effective when piglets have a low level of iron injection at birth. So for the first study, I will use three to five litters, and they will get [their] first iron injection with 200 milligrams as is typical, then 10 to 14 days before weaning, there will be a secondary iron injection with three treatments: having no additional iron injection, a 100 milligram and 200 milligrams of iron injection.

Young Dal Jang  16:18

Then I will measure hematocrit and preweaning growth performance. So we would be able to know which level of secondary iron injection would be effective, if there is a positive effect of these additional injection on their growth, and hematocrit status. And then second study, we’ll use the same three to five litters, and we will inject two level levels of iron at birth and then have the same level of iron injection before, about 10 days before weaning. With this, we could know when we need these secondary iron injections. Probably when piglets get low level of iron at birth, this secondary iron injection will be more effective.

Young Dal Jang  17:19

So our expected research with our hypothesis, for study one, the secondary iron injection, before weaning would increase weaning weight of piglets and hematocrit status. And for study 2, when the low, low level of iron is injected to the piglets at birth, the secondary iron injection will be more effective. Let’s see the resarch to see if I can accept or reject this hypothesis.

Young Dal Jang  17:51

I hope to share the research in the future with you.  This is all my presentation. Thanks for your time and attention. And if you have any question, please feel free to email me at this email address [youngdal.jang@uwrf.edu]. Thank you and bye bye.