Increased arginine, lysine, and methionine levels can improve the performance, gut integrity and immune status of turkeys but the effect is interactive and depends on challenge conditions

Table 5 mRNA expression levels of selected genes encoding gut integrity regulators, nutrient transporters and digestive enzymes in turkeys at 28 days of age

Parameter		N	GLUT 1	GLUT 2	PEPT 1	PEPT 2	ASCT 1	ZO 1	OCCL	BoAT	SI	EAAT 3	CCK 1	CAT 1	CCK
Diet¹
Low ArgLysMet		24	0.812	0.236	0.196^a	0.789^b	0.928	0.565	0.611	0.874	0.788^a	0.301	6.551	1.000	2.368
High ArgLysMet		24	0.803	0.226	0.147^b	1.107^a	0.928	0.56	0.698	0.66	0.563^b	0.33	6.499	1.076	2.075
Challenge²
No		16	0.865	0.390^a	0.271^a	1.126	1.187^a	0.648	0.919^a	1.003	0.946^a	0.502^a	6.144	1.433^a	1.732
C. perfringens		16	0.736	0.155^b	0.135^b	0.757	0.728^b	0.494	0.424^c	0.686	0.573^b	0.183^b	5.654	0.988^b	2.569
LPS		16	0.821	0.148^b	0.109^b	0.962	0.868^b	0.545	0.620b	0.612	0.508^b	0.262^b	7.777	0.692^c	2.363
Treatments
Low ArgLysMet	No	8	0.699	0.380	0.313	0.939	1.035^ab	0.606	0.747	1.202	1.162	0.495	4.878	1.200	1.936
Low ArgLysMet	C. perfringens	8	0.769	0.188	0.144	0.826	0.768^b	0.506	0.473	0.794	0.703	0.225	5.914	0.946	2.986
Low ArgLysMet	LPS	8	0.968	0.138	0.132	0.601	0.980^ab	0.583	0.613	0.627	0.499	0.185	8.86	0.854	2.181
High ArgLysMet	No	8	1.03	0.399	0.229	1.312	1.340^a	0.691	1.091	0.804	0.73	0.51	7.41	1.666	1.529
High ArgLysMet	C. perfringens	8	0.703	0.121	0.126	0.687	0.688^b	0.481	0.375	0.578	0.443	0.142	5.393	1.031	2.151
High ArgLysMet	LPS	8	0.674	0.159	0.085	1.323	0.756^b	0.508	0.627	0.597	0.517	0.339	6.694	0.531	2.546
SEM			0.043	0.020	0.015	0.077	0.051	0.026	0.042	0.078	0.051	0.03	0.459	0.068	0.152
P-value
Diet			0.906	0.668	0.034	0.025	0.997	0.928	0.117	0.165	0.007	0.526	0.953	0.435	0.317
Challenge			0.421	0.001	0.001	0.101	0.001	0.053	0.001	0.095	0.001	0.001	0.131	0.001	0.058
Diet × Challenge			0.010	0.171	0.501	0.045	0.037	0.433	0.005	0.618	0.074	0.110	0.099	0.007	0.240

¹Low ArgLysMet, diets with low arginine, lysine and methionine levels; High ArgLysMet, diets with high arginine, lysine and methionine levels.
²At 25, 26, and 27 days of age, birds were challenged either with C. perfringens type A strain 56 (C. perfringens) or lipopolysaccharide from Escherichia coli (LPS), or served as a placebo group with no challenge (No). ^a,b,cMeans within a row with different superscripts differ significantly (P < 0.05). GLUT 1: Glucose transporter-1, GLUT 2: Glucose transporter-2, PEPT 1: Peptide transporter-1, PEPT 2: Peptide transporter-2, ASCT 1: Alanine, serine, cysteine, and threonine transporter, ZO 1: Zonula occludens 1, OCCL: Occludin, BoAT: Solute carrier family 6, member 19, SI: Sucrase isomaltase, EAAT 3: Excitatory amino acid transporter 3, CCK 1: Cholecystokinin type 1 receptor, CAT 1: Cationic amino acid transporter-1, CCK: Cholecystokinin.

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