Effect of dietary Chlorella vulgaris and carbohydrate-active enzymes on the general health, immune status, antioxidant capacity, and liver lipids and metabolites of weaned piglets

It was evaluated the impact of dietary inclusion of Chlorella vulgaris (CH) and carbohydrases on the general health, immune and oxidative status, and hepatic lipids and metabolites of piglets. Forty-four male weaned piglets were allocated into four diets: control (n=11), CH (control diet with 5% CH, n=10), CH+R (control diet with 5% CH plus 0.005% Rovabio^®Excel AP, n=10), and CH+M (control diet with 5% CH plus 0.01% of a pre-selected four-CAZyme mixture, n=11) for 15 days. Total cholesterol, LDL-cholesterol and VLDL-cholesterol were increased by CH. In piglets fed CH-based diets, the interplay observed between IgG increase and IgM decrease contributed for piglets’ survival during weaning. n-6 PUFA were lower in piglets fed CH with or without feed enzymes and the inverse occurred for n-3 PUFA, thus benefiting n-6/n-3 ratio in the liver. The discriminant analysis applied to hepatic variables revealed a good separation between control and CH-based diets but failed to discriminate feed enzymes addition. Minor variations were promoted by Rovabio or the pre-selected enzymatic mixture, thus suggesting some improvement on microalga nutrients digestibility. Taken together, our findings indicate a health promoting effect of CH as feed ingredient in piglets’ nutrition during the weaning period, without negatively impacting on animals’ performance.