Immune transcriptomic profile in adult female pigs: dominance status has more influence than environmental enrichment.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Assessing farm animals' welfare is crucial, yet practical physiological tools are still lacking. In this study, we tested whether the peripheral blood mononuclear cell (PBMC) transcriptome shows variations in association with sows' welfare. To do this, we compared animals whose welfare states were assumed to differ due to their lives in more or less enriched environments and to their different dominance statuses. Sows were housed in a conventional (C, n = 36) or enriched (E, n = 35) environments from gestation day 0 (G0) until three weeks before farrowing (G105), after which they were transferred to individual farrowing crates. From G99 to G103, behavioral analyses were conducted, and sows' dominance status was evaluated. A subset of 28 multiparous sows (C, n = 14 and E,

SUBMITTER: Lopes MM 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11657968 | biostudies-literature | 2024 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature