. 2023 Jul 7;13(13):2236. doi: 10.3390/ani13132236

Table 1.

Effects of the use of yeast β-glucans (from Saccharomyces cerevisiae) on the intestinal health and growth performance of nursery pigs ^1,2.

Item	Initial BW (kg) or Age (d)	Experimental Period (d)	β-Glucan Compound (mg/kg)	β-Glucan (mg/kg)	Results			Reference
Intestinal health	8.0 kg	28	500	141	Increased jejunal goblet cells, tended to decrease diarrhea during d 0 to 14, tended to increase VH:CD, and tended to increase apparent ileal and total tract digestibility of energy			[54]
	6.4 kg	35	-	100, 200, 300, and 400	Linearly increased apparent total tract digestibility of nutrients			[55]
	5.8 kg	21	-	50, 100, and 150	Increased villus height and VH:CD on the jejunum			[61]
	15.3 kg	28	-	250	Decreased Enterobacteria spp. In ileum and proximal colon			[39]
Item	Initial BW (kg) or age (d)	Experimental period (d)	β-glucan compound (mg/kg)	β-glucan (mg/kg)	ADG (% change)	ADFI (% change)	G:F (% change)	Reference
Growth performance	4.9 kg	28	-	250	19.9 **	23.2 **	−1.1	[58]
				500	7.7	11.6	−1.1
	5.0 kg	28	-	1000	−1.9	−7.1 **	2.6
				1000	0	−1.5 **	0
	28 d	28	-	150	10.6	7.4	0	[62]
				300	15.8	15.4 *	0	[62]
	8.7 ³ kg	28	-	25	11.4	7.5	3.1	[10]
				50	14.8	11.6	2.7
				100	−3	−4.6	0.6
				200	−4.8	−3.7	−1.3
	8.2 kg	28	-	50	12.7 **	11.5 **	1.3
	6.4 ⁴ kg	35	-	100	4.7	3.2	1.6	[55]
				200	10.5	9	0
				300	11	6.8	3.2
				400	10.7	5.4	4.8
	6.2 kg	35	-	200	5.9	1.8	4.2
	5.8 kg	21	-	50	8.4 **	2.4	5.9	[61]
				100	12.9 **	6.0 **	6.6
				150	12.3 **	8.8	3.2
	8.0 kg	28	500	141	6.7 *	2.8	3.8	[54]
	6.0 kg	35	2000	NA	7.4 **	6.5 **	0.9	[64]
	6.0 kg	48	2000	NA	−5.5	−6.9	1.6	[65]
	Average % change:				7.6	5.3	1.9

BW, body weight; NA, not available; VH:CD, villus height to crypt depth ratio. ¹ Asterisk marks (*, **) represent statistical tendency (p < 0.10) and significant difference (p < 0.05), respectively. ² The percentage increase or decrease in the average daily gain (ADG), average daily feed intake (ADFI), and gain-to-feed ratio (G:F) was determined in beta-glucan supplementation groups relative to the control group. ³ β-glucan supplementation contents quadratically increased (p < 0.05) the ADG of nursery pigs. ⁴ β-glucan supplementation contents linearly tended to increase (p < 0.10) the ADG of nursery pigs.