Abstract
Investigations were carried out in a swine model, to understand the distribution of the mycotoxin zearalenone (ZEA) and one of its phase I metabolites, α-zearalenol (α-ZOL) along the digestive tract and in the faeces of pigs following ingestion of ZEA at 200 μg/kg feed. In parallel, the administration of ZEA in feed amended with 4kg/T Mycosorb A+ (MSA+) was evaluated to test if MSA+ would increase the ZEA/α-ZOL recoveries in faeces and would decrease consequently the ZEA uptake in the digestive tract. Experimental diets included a commercial pig feed base diet (F0); the base feed amended with ZEA (F1); and the base feed amended with a combination of ZEA and MSA+ (F2). All feeds contained a digestibility marker (Celite™) and 10% cracked wheat. Individually housed pigs (n=12) were given F0 over a one-week adaptation period, followed by four-weeks where half the pigs (n=6) were randomly assigned either to F1 or F2 treatments. At the end, four pigs from each treatment were sacrificed, and remaining pigs underwent a two-weeks washout period using F0 before being sacrificed. Faecal samples were taken biweekly and reproductive tract samples at the end of treatments or wash-out. ZEA and α-ZOL quantitative analysis was performed using immunoaffinity extraction before separation on a RP-C18 HPLC system equipped with fluorescent detection. The amount of ZEA recovered in faeces vs. added in the diet was calculated. Results showed that animals receiving F2 regimen significantly (p<0.0001) exhibited higher concentration of both ZEA and α-ZOL in faeces compared to F1 challenged pigs (30.5 vs 54.7% at 4 weeks). MSA+ significantly reduced the accumulation of ZEA (77 vs 15 μg/kg) and [ZEA+α-ZOL] (89 vs 17 μg/kg) in the reproductive tract after five weeks. These results indicate that MSA+ successfully decreased ZEA uptake and metabolization, whilst increasing digestive clearance of ZEA via faeces.
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