ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Cell. Infect. Microbiol.
Sec. Bacteria and Host
Volume 15 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fcimb.2025.1553639
This article is part of the Research TopicAdvances in Nutritional Strategies for Optimizing Swine Growth Performance and Gut HealthView all 5 articles
Intramuscular iron supplementation enhances intestinal barrier function in weaned piglets challenged with enterotoxigenic Escherichia coli
Provisionally accepted
Chenying Tian1Xiaofeng Zhang2Yecheng Xu1
林凤 Linfeng1Jing Zhao1Qingqing Xiong1
Yuhui Zhang1Shouchuan Jiang1Yu Han1
Huahua Du1*- 1Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China
- 2Zhejiang Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Hangzhou, Zhejiang, China
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Since iron is an essential mineral for both host and microbial communities, how to scientifically replenish the iron in the context of bacterial infection has become a critical issue.The aim of this study was to compare the influence of intramuscular and oral iron supplementation on the progression of bacterial infection. We used weaned piglets as an experimental model to supplement iron after enterotoxigenic Escherichia coli (ETEC) K88 infection and found that intramuscular iron supplementation alleviated the clinical symptoms of bacterial infection by deducing the diarrhea rate and alleviated inflammatory response. Compared to oral iron supplementation, intramuscular iron supplementation significantly mitigated the intestinal damage caused by ETEC K88 infection by increasing the ratio of villus length to crypt depth, and repairing epithelial tight junction. Furthermore, intramuscular iron supplementation also protected the function of intestinal goblet cells and improved iron metabolism of infected piglets. Our finding clearly demonstrated that intramuscular iron supplementation is more effective during infection than oral supplementation.
Keywords: Intramuscular iron supplementation, Oral iron supplementation, Weaned piglets, ETEC K88, Diarrhea, intestinal barrier function
Received: 31 Dec 2024; Accepted: 30 Jun 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Tian, Zhang, Xu, Linfeng, Zhao, Xiong, Zhang, Jiang, Han and Du. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Huahua Du, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China
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