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Maternal dietary supplementation of arginine increases the ratio of total cloned piglets born to total transferred cloned embryos by improving the pregnancy rate of recipient sows.

Authors :
Li, Zicong
Yue, Zhimin
Ao, Zheng
Zhao, Chengfa
Zhao, Chengcheng
Cai, Gengyuan
Zheng, Enqin
Yang, Jie
Gu, Ting
Yang, Huaqiang
Hong, Linjun
Xu, Zheng
Liu, Dewu
Wu, Zhenfang
Shi, Junsong
Zeng, Fang
Source :
Animal Reproduction Science. Sep2018, Vol. 196, p211-218. 8p.
Publication Year :
2018

Abstract

The extremely low full-term developmental efficiency of cloned pig embryos limits the practical application of pig cloning techniques. Maternal dietary supplementation of the nutritionally important amino acid, arginine, can enhance prenatal developmental rate of in vivo fertilization-derived pig embryos. It was hypothesized that maternal dietary addition of arginine can also improve the developmental capacity of cloned pig embryos. To test this hypothesis, there was a comparison of the reproductive performance between recipient sows fed an L-arginine-supplemented diet (L-Arg group) and those fed the control diet (control group). There was a subsequent comparison of the developmental indexes of cloned piglets farrowed in the L-Arg and control groups of surrogate sows. Dietary supplementation of L-arginine during gestation days 14–75 increased the plasma concentrations of arginine and arginine metabolites, including nitric oxide, spermidine, and putrescine in recipient sows of transferred cloned pig embryos. Although maternal arginine addition did not affect the birth weight and placental development indexes of newborn cloned piglets, it significantly increased the ratio of total cloned piglets born to total transferred cloned pig embryos by increasing the pregnancy rate of recipient sows. The results of this study suggest that nutritional management of recipient sows is an effective approach to improve the developmental rate of cloned pig embryos. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Details

Language :
English
ISSN :
03784320
Volume :
196
Database :
Academic Search Index
Journal :
Animal Reproduction Science
Publication Type :
Academic Journal
Accession number :
131402407
Full Text :
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.anireprosci.2018.08.013