Stressors, including limited access to feed, heat stress, transportation, and disease are factors that reduce integrity of the gut epithelial barrier in livestock. Feeding Saccharomyces cerevisiae fermentation products (SCFP) mitigated immunological, aflatoxin, and subclinical mastitis challenges, heat stress, and grain-based subacute ruminal acidosis indicating it also could alleviate gut damage. Microbiota profiling of ileal epithelium using 16S rRNA sequencing and bioinformatics revealed that Lactobacillales and Animalis abundance was greater in cows fed SCFP versus controls during a 5-d feed restriction to induce intestinal dysfunction. Some genera of Firmicutes, Bacteroidota phylum, and Treponema genus were correlated with mRNA abundance of genes associated with integrity and inflammation of ileal epithelium. Thus, feeding SCFP can increase the abundance of beneficial bacteria during a gut challenge.

Read the full article in the Journal of Animal Science.