ASSESSMENT OF MIXED MINERALS BY OBSERVING INTESTINAL EPITHELIAL CELL ALTERATIONS IN PIGLETS

The experiment was conducted to assess the effect of dietary Mixed Minerals (MM) on intestinal epithelial cell morphology, villus height and area and growth performance in piglets. Thirty two-month-old hybrid piglets (15 kg BW) (Large White × Landrace × Duroc), consisting of 15 castrated males and 15 females, were allocated into three experimental groups with five replicates of one castrated male and one female per replicate. The basal diet was supplemented with MM at 0 (control), 0.05 and 0.1% for 30 days. Compared with dome-shaped epithelial cells on the intestinal villus apical surface, further protuberated dome-shaped cells were observed in the 0.05% MM group and cell clusters comprised of dome-shaped cells appeared in the 0.1% MM group. However, the villus height and villus area as well as growth performance were not affected, except that the feed intake and average daily feed intake of the 0.1% MM group increased compared with those of the 0.05% MM group (p<0.05); as well, body weight gain of the 0.1% MM group was 4% greater than the control. These results suggest that MM can stimulate functions of epithelial cells with increasing levels of MM, but that they have no power to improve body weight gain resulting from increased villus activity and that MM have no function to affect growth performance but might affect other biochemical functions, such as immunity processes in the body.