Accurate Parturition prediction is of great significance for reducing piglet mortality and improving PSY (Piglets per Sow per Year), and is a key requirement for intelligent pig farming systems. Despite its importance, early and reliable prediction is challenging, as current methods rarely capture detailed local physiological variations with spatio-temporal modeling, and farrowing annotations are limited in practical breeding environments. In this study, we propose a novel lightweight spatio-temporal framework that models vulvar variations for accurate sow parturition prediction, integrating local physiological perception, temporal feature extraction, and few-shot adaptive inference. Different from conventional behavior-driven approaches, the proposed method explicitly focuses on the sow vulva as a key physiological region and formulates parturition prediction as a region-centric and time-aware visual learning problem. A lightweight LSConv-enhanced YOLOv8n-seg model is first employed to robustly segment the vulva region, ensuring stable extraction of physiological visual representation. Based on the segmented regions, a Temporal Physiological Encoder is designed to model the joint evolution of morphological, color, and texture features using a sequence learning strategy, enabling effective representation of gradual physiological variations before parturition. To address the limited availability of annotated farrowing events, an attention-calibrated prototype network is introduced to enable few-shot learning, improving prediction reliability by adaptively combining limited support examples into refined class prototypes. Experimental results demonstrate that the proposed framework achieves enhanced performance in segmentation accuracy, temporal feature discrimination, and farrowing prediction accuracy, achieving 90.48\% accuracy for farrowing early warning within 12-hour while maintaining a lightweight and deployable architecture. This work represents the first attempt to automatically identify and quantitatively model sow vulva physiological variations for parturition prediction. By leveraging lightweight spatio-temporal modeling of vulvar variations, combined with temporal physiological feature extraction and adaptive few-shot learning, the proposed framework offers an effective and practical solution for accurate sow parturition prediction, providing new insights into advanced image-based techniques in precision livestock farming.

Early microbial exposure during embryogenesis may shape post-hatch gut development in poultry, yet the effects of sublethal pathogenic exposure and in ovo synbiotics remain unclear. This model-establishment study preliminarily established in ovo Salmonella Enteritidis (SE) infection and synbiotic (SYN) delivery models and evaluated their effects on hatchability, cecal microbiota, intestinal morphology, epithelial turnover, and barrier function in newly hatched chicks. In one group, the air cells of specific pathogen-free White Leghorn eggs were injected with SE on embryonic day 12; in another group, a synbiotic consisting of Lactobacillus plantarum, Pediococcus acidilactici, and inulin was injected into the amniotic cavity on embryonic day 17.5. Sterile saline was injected as the vehicle-only procedural control at the corresponding time points and injection sites. Based on their impacts on hatchability, SE1-L and SYN-H were selected. SE1-L reduced cecal microbial diversity, expanded Proteobacteria and Escherichia-Shigella, increased ileal apoptosis and crypt depth, decreased the villus height-to-crypt depth ratio, downregulated jejunal tight-junction genes, upregulated ileal MYD88 and TNF-α, and increased plasma lipopolysaccharide and D-lactate. In contrast, SYN-H maintained hatchability, promoted early Pediococcus colonization, suppressed potential pathogens, increased ileal villus height and villus height-to-crypt depth ratio, enhanced proliferation, reduced apoptosis, and improved mucosal barrier-related indices. These findings provide preliminary evidence that embryonic SE infection and synbiotic delivery differentially influence early intestinal microbiota succession and gut development in newly hatched chicks.

Dimethylated monothioarsenate (DMMTA), an emerging thiolated organic arsenical frequently detected in rice, exhibits in vitro cytotoxicity comparable to trivalent inorganic arsenic. However, its in vivo hepatotoxicity and underlying mechanisms remain largely unknown. Here, a 28-day subacute DMMTA exposure study was conducted in C57BL/6 mice, integrating hepatic transcriptomics, targeted bile acid metabolomics and 16S rRNA microbiome profiling to elucidate DMMTA-induced perturbations along the gut-liver axis. Phenotypically, DMMTA induced an atypical hepatotoxicity characterized by paradoxical liver atrophy coexisting with severe steatosis, alongside inflammatory infiltration and a non-monotonic elevation of liver ALT activity. Mechanistically, DMMTA critically impaired hepatic detoxification and redox homeostasis, evidenced by the inhibited nuclear translocation of Nrf2 and the concerted suppression of downstream xenobiotic-metabolizing genes (e.g., Gsts, Ugts). Targeted metabolomics revealed a profound disruption of enterohepatic circulation, marked by a 29% reduction in the primary to secondary bile acid ratio and 6.0-fold increase in toxic accumulation of 6,7-diketo LCA. Concurrently, microbiome profiling identified a highly selective dysbiosis driven by the massive expansion of Negativibacillus (71.1-fold) and the depletion of Blautia (20.3-fold). Multi-omics integration (Procrustes, M² < 0.46, P < 0.05) robustly linked these microbiota shifts to the accumulation of hepatotoxic secondary bile acids. Collectively, this study challenges the traditional "low toxicity" paradigm of organic arsenicals and highlights the gut-liver axis as a central mediator of DMMTA hepatotoxicity, providing vital mechanistic evidence to refine environmental risk assessment for rice-based diets.

Copper supplements are prominent antibiotic alternatives in livestock production, but their excessive use poses environmental risks, necessitating safer substitutes. Potassium diformate (KDF), an organic acid salt, has shown potential as a feed additive, yet its effectiveness in copper-unsupplemented diets remains unclear. This study compared the effects of copper glycinate (Cu_Gly) and KDF on weaned piglets fed a copper-unsupplemented basal diet. Forty-five Meishan piglets were allocated to a control group (basal diet), a Cu_Gly group (basal diet + 60 mg/kg Cu_Gly), or a KDF group (basal diet + 10 g/kg KDF). The KDF group exhibited a lower feed conversion ratio (FCR) than the control group. Although no significant differences in average daily gain were observed, KDF supplementation significantly enhanced immune function by increasing plasma IgG and decreasing IgM, IL-6, and IL-1 levels compared to the control. 16S rRNA sequencing analysis revealed that the Control group was enriched with pathogenic genera (Staphylococcus, Escherichia-Shigella, Brevibacterium) in the ileum and cecum. Cu_Gly supplementation enriched Bacillus, Longispora, and Terrisporobacterin the ileum, while KDF increased the abundance of beneficial taxa (TM7, Nesterenkoniain the ileum; Lachnospiraceae_UCG-007 in the cecum). Correlation analysis showed that the abundances of Escherichia-Shigella and Staphylococcus were negatively correlated with IgG but positively correlated with IgM and IL-6. Cecal Lachnospiraceae_UCG-007 (enriched in the KDF group) was negatively correlated with IL-1. In summary, KDF improved feed efficiency and demonstrates superior immunomodulatory effects compared to Cu_Gly. The enrichment of bacteria linked to metal resistance in the Cu_Gly group suggested a potential drawback not associated with KDF. Therefore, KDF represented a viable and sustainable alternative to copper supplements, offering a combination of improved gut health, enhanced immunity, and a reduced environmental risk profile.

The resting postures of piglets are crucial indicators for assessing their health status and environmental comfort. This study proposes a resting posture recognition method for piglets during lactation based on the PPR-YOLO model, aiming to enhance the detection accuracy and classification capability for different piglet resting postures. Firstly, to address the issue of numerous sows and piglets in the farrowing house that easily occlude each other, an image edge detection algorithm is employed to precisely locate the sow’s farrowing bed area. By cropping the images, irrelevant background interference is reduced, thereby enhancing the model’s recognition accuracy. Secondly, to overcome the limitations of the YOLOv11 model in fine feature extraction and small object detection, improvements are made, resulting in the proposed PPR-YOLO model. Specific enhancements include the introduction of a multi-branch Conv2 module to enrich feature extraction capabilities and the adoption of an inverted bottleneck IBCNeck module, which expands the number of channels and incorporates a channel attention mechanism. This strengthens the model’s ability to capture and differentiate subtle posture features. Additionally, in the post-processing stage, the relative positions between sows and piglets are utilized to filter out piglets located outside the sow region, eliminating interference from sow nursing behaviors in resting posture recognition, thereby ensuring the accuracy of posture classification. The experimental results show that the proposed method achieves accurate piglet posture recognition, outperforming mainstream object detection algorithms. Ablation experiments validate the effectiveness of image cropping and model enhancements in improving performance. This method provides effective technical support for the automated monitoring of piglet welfare in commercial farms and holds promising application prospects.

Dimethylated monothioarsenate (DMMTA), a thiolated organic arsenic species prevalent in rice and processed products and accounting for up to 38 % of total arsenic, exhibits poorly characterized in vivo toxicity despite its 3.7-6.7-fold higher cytotoxicity than inorganic arsenite (iAsIII). This study systematically evaluated DMMTA's acute oral toxicity in C57BL/6J mice using a tiered experimental design: initial median lethal dose (LD50) estimation via the up-and-down procedure (UDP) in female mice, followed by comprehensive profiling using the modified Karber's method (mKM) across escalating doses (0, 55, 110, 220, and 440 mg/kg) in both sexes to determine dose-response relationships. Striking sex-specific dimorphism was observed: male mice exhibited a 1.86-fold lower LD50 (109.65 mg/kg) than females (204.17 mg/kg). At 110 mg/kg, males showed suppressed weight gain and elevated serum low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C), while females displayed hypercholesterolemia (elevated serum total cholesterol, TC). Hematological analysis revealed male-specific neutropenia/monocytopenia with compensatory lymphocytosis in 55-110 mg/kg groups, contrasting with females exposed to 110 mg/kg which displayed monocytosis/basophilia. Histopathology confirmed multi-organ damage, including cardiac myofibril disarray, hepatic inflammation, renal glomerular hypertrophy, splenic red pulp congestion, and gastrointestinal mucosal erosion. These data provide foundational evidence for revising arsenic risk assessment to prioritize species-specific toxicity, particularly in establishing science-based regulatory limits for DMMTA in rice.

With the rapid development of intelligent farming technologies, effectively evaluating piglet competition behaviour during the suckling period has become a key research focus for enhancing livestock management. This paper presents a method for evaluating the piglet suckling competition index, which integrates the YOLOv10 object detection algorithm and optical flow direction distribution features. First, the YOLOv10 model is employed to detect the sow's posture and the positions of the piglets, classifying the sow's posture into lateral recumbency and other postures. Subsequently, precise localisation of the lactation period is achieved by calculating the mask ratio of the piglets within the sow's region and the changes in group activity. Finally, the Farneback optical flow algorithm is utilised to analyse the direction distribution of the optical flow within the piglet region, and the variation coefficient of information entropy is employed to quantify the intensity of piglet suckling competition. Experimental results demonstrate that the proposed method performs well in both object detection and behaviour localisation, achieving a precision of 91.51 % and a recall of 96.04 % for lactation period localisation. Additionally, the method successfully validated the evaluation of piglet suckling competition in different test pens. This study provides technical support for intelligent farming technologies, helping to optimise piglet nutrition management and enhance farming efficiency.

This study proposes an efficient and accurate multi-object tracking method for piglets (Piglet Keypoints and L2 Distance Tracking, PKL-Track) to achieve piglet state monitoring and activity quantification. The proposed method employs the improved YOLOv11s-Pose model for target and keypoint detection, utilizing the relative positions of piglet bounding boxes to refine keypoint regression while optimizing the detection head to enhance model efficiency. To address challenges such as occlusion and target crowding, the BoT-SORT algorithm was improved by incorporating keypoint and bounding box information to refine matching distances, supplemented by normalized Euclidean distance to expand matching range. Experiments were conducted using video data from 31 piglet pens, constructing a dataset containing targets, keypoints, and tracking annotations for testing. Results demonstrated that the improved YOLOv11s-Pose model achieved an average precision of 98.5 % for object detection and 98.0 % for keypoint detection, with a detection time of 5.0 ms per frame. For multi-object tracking tasks, short frame intervals (5 frames) achieved 84.3 % HOTA, 99.1 % MOTA, and 91.5 % IDF1, significantly reducing ID switches. Activity quantification experiments based on tracking results revealed a relative error of only 2.36 % in group activity measurement, accurately reflecting piglet activity levels. The proposed method demonstrates excellent performance in multi-object tracking and activity quantification, providing key technological support for behavior monitoring and piglet health assessment in precision livestock farming.

OBJECTIVE:Vanin-1 (VNN1) is a pantetheinase that catalyses the hydrolysis of pantetheine to produce pantothenic acid and cysteamine. Our previous studies have shown that the VNN1 is specifically expressed in chicken liver which negatively regulated by microRNA-122. However, the functions of the VNN1 in lipid metabolism in chicken liver haven't been elucidated.METHODS:First, we detected the VNN1 mRNA expression in 4-week chickens which were fasted 24 hours. Next, knocked out VNN1 via CRISPR/Cas9 system in the chicken Leghorn Male Hepatoma cell line. Detected the lipid deposition via oil red staining and analysis the content of triglycerides (TG), low-density lipoprotein-C (LDL-C), and highdensity lipoprotein-C (HDL-C) after VNN1 knockout in Leghorn Male Hepatoma cell line. Then we captured various differentially expressed genes (DEGs) between VNN1-modified LMH cells and original LMH cells by RNA-seq.RESULTS:Firstly, fasting-induced expression of VNN1. Meanwhile, we successfully used the CRISPR/Cas9 system to achieve targeted mutations of the VNN1 in the chicken LMH cell line. Moreover, the expression level of VNN1 mRNA in LMH-KO-VNN1 cells decreased compared with that in the wild-type LMH cells (p<0.0001). Compared with control, lipid deposition was decreased after knockout VNN1 via oil red staining, meanwhile, the contents of TG and LDL-C were significantly reduced, and the content of HDL-C was increased in LMH-KO-VNN1 cells. Transcriptome sequencing showed that there were 1,335 DEGs between LMH-KO-VNN1 cells and original LMH cells. Of these DEGs, 431 were upregulated, and 904 were downregulated. Gene ontology analyses of all DEGs showed that the lipid metabolism-related pathways, such as fatty acid biosynthesis and long-chain fatty acid biosynthesis, were enriched. KEGG pathway analyses showed that "lipid metabolism pathway", "energy metabolism", and "carbohydrate metabolism" were enriched. A total of 76 DEGs were involved in these pathways, of which 29 genes were upregulated (such as cytochrome P450 family 7 subfamily A member 1, ELOVL fatty acid elongase 2, and apolipoprotein A4) and 47 genes were downregulated (such as phosphoenolpyruvate carboxykinase 1) by VNN1 knockout in the LMH cells.CONCLUSION:These results suggest that VNN1 plays an important role in coordinating lipid metabolism in the chicken liver.

Heat stress (HS) disrupts intestinal microbiota, glycolipid metabolism, and hepatic mitochondrial function in late gestational mice. Baicalin (BAI), a Chinese herbal medicine known for its heat-clearing and anti-inflammatory properties, has shown promise in modulating intestinal microecology and mitigating inflammation in various organs. This study investigates whether baicalin attenuates HS-induced intestinal microbial dysbiosis and liver damage in pregnant mice during late gestation. Twenty-four pregnant mice were randomly assigned to four groups, including thermoneutral (TN) (24 ± 1 ℃), HS (35 ± 1 ℃), HS+BAI200 (oral gavaged with 200 mg/kg BW of BAI), and HS+BAI400 (oral gavaged with 400 mg/kg BW of BAI). 400 mg/kg BAI treatment markedly decreased the rectal temperature and increased fetal weight in HS pregnant mice. Furthermore, 400 mg/kg BAI administration effectively ameliorated HS-induced hepatic damage and lipid disorders, reducing HSP70, AST, and ALT levels while increasing TG concentration. Notably, it activated a network of genes involved in lipid synthesis, including fatty acid synthase (FAS), acetyl-CoA carboxylase (ACC), and oxidation, such as peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor alpha (PPARα), carnitine palmityl transferase 1 beta (CPT1β). Moreover, BAI intervention restored the intestinal morphology and barrier function, evidenced by increased intestinal villus height, the ratio of villus height to crypt depth, and colonic goblet cells numbers. 400 mg/kg of BAI treatment up-regulated the expression of tight junction proteins, such as claudin-1 and Zonula Occludens-1 (ZO-1), in the jejunum and ileum, counteracting HS-induced downregulation. High-throughput sequencing showed that BAI treatment altered cecal microbial composition, increasing the relative abundance of beneficial Bacteroidota and decreasing Deferribacterota, Turicibacter, and Akkermansia. Spearman’s correlation analysis highlighted significant correlations between differential cecal microbiota and physiological indexes. In conclusion, BAI administration alleviated adverse impacts in heat-exposed mice during late gestation, improving maternal physiological parameters, and ameliorating hepatic damage with altered cecal microbial composition. The findings suggest that BAI may regulate the gut-liver axis by modulating intestinal morphology, microecology, and hepatic function.

The present study aimed to investigate the impacts of dietary standardized ileal digestible lysine to net energy (SID Lys:NE) ratio on lipid metabolism in pigs fed high-wheat diets. Thirty-six crossbred growing barrows (65.20 ± 0.38 kg) were blocked into two treatment groups, fed high-wheat diets with either a high SID Lys:NE ratio (HR) or a low SID Lys:NE ratio (LR). Each treatment group consisted of three replicates, with six pigs per pen in each replicate. The diminishing dietary SID Lys:NE ratio exhibited no adverse impacts on the carcass trait (p > 0.05) but increased the marbling score of the longissimus dorsi muscle (p < 0.05). Meanwhile, LR diets tended to increase the serum triglyceride concentration (p < 0.1). LR diets upregulated fatty acid transport protein 4 and acetyl-coA carboxylase α expression levels and downregulated the expression level of adipose triglyceride lipase (p < 0.05). LR diets improved energy metabolism via decreasing the expression levels of AMP-activated protein kinase (AMPK) α1, sirtuin 1 (SIRT1), and peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor-γ coactivator-1α (PGC-1α) (p < 0.05). Additionally, LR diets stimulated hepatic bile acid synthesis via upregulating the expression levels of cytochrome P450 family 7 subfamily A member 1 and cytochrome P450 family 27 subfamily A member 1, and downregulating farnesol X receptor (FXR) and small heterodimer partner (SHP) expression levels (p < 0.05). A lowered SID Lys:NE ratio affected the colonic microbial composition, characterized by increased relative abundances of YRC22, Parabacteroides, Sphaerochaeta, and Bacteroides, alongside a decreased in the proportion of Roseburia, f_Lachnospiraceae_g_Clostridium, Enterococcus, Shuttleworthia, Exiguobacterium, Corynebacterium, Subdoligranulum, Sulfurospirillum, and Marinobacter (p < 0.05). The alterations in microbial composition were accompanied by a decrease in colonic butyrate concentration (p < 0.1). The metabolomic analysis revealed that LR diets affected primary bile acid synthesis and AMPK signaling pathway (p < 0.05). And the mantel analysis indicated that Parabacteroides, Sphaerochaeta, f_Lachnospiraceae_g_Clostridium, Shuttleworthia, and Marinobacter contributed to the alterations in body metabolism. A reduced dietary SID Lys:NE ratio improves energy metabolism, stimulates lipogenesis, and inhibits lipolysis in finishing pigs by regulating the AMPKα/SIRT1/PGC-1α pathway and the FXR/SHP pathway. Parabacteroides and Sphaerochaeta benefited bile acids synthesis, whereas f_Lachnospiraceae_g_Clostridium, Shuttleworthia, and Marinobacter may contribute to the activation of the AMPK signaling pathway. Overall, body metabolism and colonic microbiota collectively controlled the lipid metabolism in finishing pigs.

The current study aimed to investigate the metabolic and microbial mechanisms behind the effects of dietary wheat levels on intramuscular fat (IMF) content in the psoas major muscle (PM) of finishing pigs. Thirty-six barrows were arbitrarily assigned to two groups and fed with diets containing 25% or 55% wheat. Enhancing dietary wheat levels led to low energy states, resulting in reduced IMF content. This coincided with reduced serum glucose and low-density lipoprotein cholesterol levels. The AMP-activated protein kinase α2/sirtuin 1/peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor-γ coactivator 1α pathway may be activated by high-wheat diets, causing downregulation of adipogenesis and lipogenesis genes, and upregulation of lipolysis and gluconeogenesis genes. High-wheat diets decreased relative abundance of Lactobacillus and Coprococcus, whereas increased SMB53 proportion, subsequently decreasing colonic propionate content. Microbial glycolysis/gluconeogenesis, d-glutamine and D-glutamate metabolism, flagellar assembly, and caprolactam degradation were linked to IMF content. Metabolomic analysis indicated that enhancing dietary wheat levels promoted the protein digestion and absorption and affected amino acids and lipid metabolism. Enhancing dietary wheat levels reduced serum glucose and colonic propionate content, coupled with strengthened amino acid metabolism, contributing to the low energy states. Furthermore, alterations in microbial composition and propionate resulted from high-wheat diets were associated with primary bile acid biosynthesis, arachidonic acid metabolism, steroid hormone biosynthesis, and biosynthesis of unsaturated fatty acids, as well as IMF content. Colonic microbiota played a role in reducing IMF content through modulating the propionate-mediated peroxisome proliferators-activated receptor signaling pathway. In conclusion, body energy and gut microbiota balance collectively influenced lipid metabolism.

Rice bran is a premium agricultural byproduct rich in nutrients and bioactive substances. The aim of this study was to compare the effects of fermentation with Bacillus subtilis, Lactobacillus plantarum, and a mixture of both on the bacterial communities and metabolic functions of rice bran based on omics techniques. The results showed that probiotic fermentation decreased crude fiber (CF) content, phytic acid, and trypsin inhibitor activity (TIA), and increased trichloroacetic acid soluble protein (TCA-SP), reducing sugar (RS), and total phenol (TP) in rice bran. Ten dominant genera with relative abundances greater than 1% were successfully identified, and probiotic fermentation significantly reduced the relative abundances of Enterobacter, Kasakonia, and Pantoea. A total of 63 differentially expressed metabolites (DEMs) were identified and further analysis revealed that probiotic fermentation increased essential amino acids, phenolic compounds, and organic acids in rice bran. Additionally, the di-strain probiotic fermentation of Bacillus subtilis and Lactobacillus plantarum facilitated the growth of beneficial microbiota (Limosilactobacillus, Prevotella and Dialister) and the production of bioactive substances (lactic acid, catechol, beta-tyrosine, etc.). In conclusion, co-fermentation of di-strain probiotics is a valuable method to produce functional compounds and enhance the health-promoting properties of rice bran.

Deoxynivalenol (DON) is one of the frequent Fusarium mycotoxins and poses a serious threat to public health worldwide. DON-induced weight loss is tightly connected with its ability to decrease feed intake by influencing gastrointestinal tract (GIT) motility. Our previous reports indicated that DON interfered with intestinal motility by injuring the contractility of enteric smooth muscle cells (SMC). Here, we further explored the potential mechanisms by employing a complementary method of transcriptomics and proteomics using the porcine enteric smooth muscle cell line (PISMC) as an experimental model. The transcriptomic and proteomic data uncover that the expression of numerous extracellular matrix (ECM) proteins and multiple integrin subunits were downregulated in PISMC under DON exposure, suppressing the ECM-integrin receptor interaction and its mediated signaling. Furthermore, DON treatment could depress actin polymerization, as reflected by the upregulated expression of Rho GTPase-activating proteins and cofilin in PISMC. Meanwhile, the expression levels of downstream contractile apparatus genes were significantly inhibited after challenge with DON. Taken together, the current results suggest that DON inhibits enteric SMC contractility by regulating the ECM-integrin-actin polymerization signaling pathway. Our findings provide novel insights into the potential mechanisms behind the DON toxicological effects in the GIT of humans and animals.

Day length is a critical environmental factor for regulating animal growth and development. This study aimed to investigate the effects of different day lengths on the developmental changes of growth parameters, testicular sizes, testosterone secretion in Meishan male pigs, and steroidogenesis proteins and melatonin receptors. Fourteen Meishan male pigs (10 weeks (wks) of age) with the same parity, paired in litter and body weight (BW), were evenly allocated into a short-day-length group (SDL, 10 light/14 dark) and long-day-length group (LDL, 14 light/10 dark). After 12 wks of the experiment, the LDL-treated boars had more lying time and less exploring time. The LDL treatment led to significant increases in body height, chest circumference, testicular length, testicular weight, crude protein digestibility, and fecal testosterone at the 10th and 12th wks of the experiment, and cortisol at the 10th wk, compared to the SDL treatment, with no differences in the final BW, testicular width, and epididymis weight. Furthermore, the LDL treatment significantly increased the protein levels of melatonin receptor 1b (MT2), aromatase (CYP19), and steroidogenic factor 1 (SF1) in the testis, with no differences in the protein levels of melatonin receptor 1a (MT1), steroidogenic acute regulatory (StAR), 3β-hydroxysteroid dehydrogenase (3β-HSD), and cholesterol side-chain cleavage enzyme (P450scc). The present study suggests that day length has an effect on the growth and gonadal development in male pigs maybe via MT2 and influences steroid synthesis and secretion in the testis. Therefore, proper day length should be considered in male pig breeding.

Sow farrowing is an important part of pig breeding. The accurate and effective early warning of sow behaviors in farrowing helps breeders determine whether it is necessary to intervene with the farrowing process in a timely manner and is thus essential for increasing the survival rate of piglets and the profits of pig farms. For large pig farms, human resources and costs are important considerations in farrowing supervision. The existing method, which uses cloud computing-based deep learning to supervise sow farrowing, has a high equipment cost and requires uploading all data to a cloud data center, requiring a large network bandwidth. Thus, this paper proposes an approach for the early warning and supervision of farrowing behaviors based on the embedded artificial-intelligence computing platform (NVIDIA Jetson Nano). This lightweight deep learning method allows the rapid processing of sow farrowing video data at edge nodes, reducing the bandwidth requirement and ensuring data security in the network transmission. Experiments indicated that after the model was migrated to the Jetson Nano, its precision of sow postures and newborn piglets detection was 93.5%, with a recall rate of 92.2%, and the detection speed was increased by a factor larger than 8. The early warning of 18 approaching farrowing (5 h) sows were tested. The mean error of warning was 1.02 h.

Timely identification and tracking of abnormal hens in stacked cages are of great significance for precision treatment and the elimination of sick individuals. The head features of the caged-hens are used to overcome observation difficulties caused by the cage and feathers blocking, but it is still hard to identify similar head states. To solve this problem, the fine-grained detection of caged-hens head states was developed using adaptive Brightness Adjustment in combination with Convolutional Neural Networks (FBA-CNN). Grid Region-based CNN (R-CNN), a convolution neural network (CNN), was optimized with the Squeeze-and-Excitation (SE) and Depthwise Over-parameterized Convolutional (DO-Conv) to detect layer heads from cages and to accurately cut them as single-head images. The brightness of each single-head image was adjusted adaptively and classified through the deep convolution neural network based on SE-Resnet50. Finally, we returned to the original image to realize multi-target detection with coordinate mapping. The results showed that the AP@0.5 of layer head detection using the optimized Grid R-CNN was 0.947, the accuracy of classification with SE-Resnet50 was 0.749, the F1 score was 0.637, and the mAP@0.5 of FBA-CNN was 0.846. In summary, this automated method can accurately identify different layer head states in layer cages to provide a basis for follow-up studies of abnormal behavior including dyspnea and cachexia.

Magnesium hydride (MGH), a highly promising hydrogen-producing substance/additive for hydrogen production through its hydrolysis reaction, has the potential to enhance broiler production. However, before incorporating MGH as a hydrogen-producing additive in broiler feed, it is crucial to fully understand its impact on microbiota and metabolites. In vitro fermentation models provide a fast, reproducible, and direct assessment tool for microbiota metabolism and composition. This study aims to investigate the effects of MGH and coated-magnesium hydride (CMG) on fermentation characteristics, as well as the microbiota and metabolome in the culture of in vitro fermentation using cecal inocula from broilers. After 48 h of incubation, it was observed that the presence of MGH had a significant impact on various factors. Specifically, the content of N-NH3 decreased, while the total hydrogen gas and total SCFAs increased. Furthermore, the presence of MGH promoted the abundance of SCFA-producing bacteria such as Ruminococcus, Blautia, Coprobacillus, and Dysgonomonas. On the other hand, the presence of CMG led to an increase in the concentration of lactic acid, acetic acid, and valeric acid. Additionally, CMG affected the diversity of microbiota in the culture, resulting in an enrichment of the relative abundance of Firmicutes, as well as genera of Lactobacillus, Coprococcus, and Eubacterium. Conversely, the relative abundance of the phylum Proteobacteria and pathogenic bacteria Shigella decreased. Metabolome analysis revealed that MGH and CMG treatment caused significant changes in 21 co-regulated metabolites, primarily associated with lipid, amino acid, benzenoids, and organooxygen compounds. Importantly, joint correlation analysis revealed that MGH or CMG treatments had a direct impact on the microbiota, which in turn indirectly influenced metabolites in the culture. In summary, the results of this study suggested that both MGH and coated-MGH have similar yet distinct positive effects on the microbiota and metabolites of the broiler cecal in an in vitro fermentation model.

Lowing lysine (Lys): energy ratio based on corn-soybean diets could increase intramuscular fat (IMF) content, the effectiveness of it in enhancing IMF content when corn is partially substituted by wheat is unclear. This study aimed to determine the effects of dietary wheat levels and standardized ileal digestible (SID) Lys: net energy (NE) ratio on growth performance and meat quality, alteration in gut microbiota and body metabolism, as well as its correlation with meat quality are revealed via combined microbiome and metabolomic methods. A total of 72 pigs were randomly divided into four groups and fed with high SID Lys:NE ratio (HR) diets containing 25% wheat (W25HR), low SID Lys:NE ratio (LR) diets containing 25% wheat (W25LR), HR diets containing 55% wheat (W55HR) or LR diets containing 55% wheat (W55LR). Increasing dietary wheat level impaired feed utilization during 65-90 kg phase (P < 0.05) and enhanced meat color values (P < 0.05) of longissimus dorsi (LD) in finishing pigs. Enhancing dietary wheat level decreased relative abundance of Lactobacillus and Coprococcus (P < 0.05), and inhibited microbial carbohydrate metabolism capacity (P < 0.05) in colon of finishing pigs. Changes in microbial composition and carbohydrate metabolism capacity caused by wheat level led to alteration in meat color. LR diets improved feed utilization (P < 0.05), affected amino acid and lipid metabolism, and increased IMF content in LD (P < 0.05). Reducing SID Lys:NE ratio changed the concentrations of PA, delta-tocopherol, Larginine, AzA, BA, and L-carnitine at the 25% wheat level and ARA, SDA, Glu, fructose-6-phosphate, and isorhamnetin at the 55% wheat level in the serum (P < 0.05, VIP > 1), which could serve as key biomarkers for predicting meat quality. LR diets upregulated mRNA expression levels of CCAAT/enhancer binding protein (C/ EBP) alpha (P < 0.05), C/EBP beta (P < 0.01), sterol regulatory element-binding transcription factor 1c, fatty acid synthase (FAS) (P < 0.05), while downregulated mRNA abundance of adipose triglyceride lipase (ATGL) (P < 0.05) in liver at the 25% wheat level. The mRNA expression levels of C/EBP beta (P < 0.01), FAS, acetyl-coA carboxylase and fatty acid binding protein 1 (P < 0.05) were higher in the W55LR than W55HR groups, whereas mRNA abundance of ATGL was lower (P < 0.05). These results indicated that lowering SID Lys:NE ratio promoted lipogenesis, inhibited lipolysis and improved IMF deposition in LD via altering serum metabolism in different manner at two wheat level. LR diets containing 25% wheat was recommended to enhance the growth performance of finishing pigs, while concurrently achieving higher IMF content and improved meat color in the LD.