Porcine circovirus type2 (PCV2) is a nightmare for swine raisers because this virus is presumed as the essential pathogen for the post-weaning multi-systemic wasting syndrome (PMWS) in pigs, and is linked with reproductive failure in sows. However, many prophylactic methods, including containment, sound husbandry, herd management, good sanitation, immunization and antibiotic therapy, have met limited success for various reasons under the practical conditions of swine production.
What should do to prevent this virus infection? Researchers in Institute of Subtropical Agriculture, Chinese Academy of Sciences (ISA) are coming up with arginine- a conditionally essential amino acid. Arginine engages in protein synthesis and the regeneration of adenosine triphosphate, promotes cell proliferation, vasodilatation, neurotransmission, calcium release and ultimately immunity. Besides that, arginine also plays an important role in conceptus development. “Arginine is so useful, why not use it to have a try?” Researcher REN Wenkai said.
Researchers first hypothesized that dietary arginine supplementation could inverse the reproductive failure caused by PCV2 in mice. In fact, they find that arginine supplementation decreases the abortion rate of pregnant mice and mortality of neonates caused by PCV2 infection. Meanwhile, litter number, litter birth weight and the daily weight gain of neonates also increases in the arginine group compared to the control group. The compelling results of this study provide a new road for PCV2 prevention or other infectious organism control in animal production, and even preventive medicine. At least, the swine raisers can decrease the damage caused by PCV2 infection with dietary supplementation with arginine.
“These results we have got should be checked on pigs to measure the advantages of arginine supplementation. We still need further research.” said REN.
This study is supported by the National Key Technology R&D Program in the 11th Five year Plan of China (No. 2008BADA7B00) and the National Basic Research Program of China (973 Program) (No. 2009CB118800). The main findings of this study have published on Amino Acids (doi: DOI 10.1007/s00726-011-0942-y).