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Background: Iron oversupplementation in healthy term infants may adversely affect growth and cognitive development.Objective: We hypothesized that early-life iron excess causes systemic and central nervous system iron overload, and compromises social behavior.Methods: The nursing pig was used as a translational model in a completely randomized study. On postnatal day (PD) 1, 24 pigs (1.57 ± 0.28 kg mean ± standard deviation body wt) were assigned to the following treatment groups: 1) nonsupplemented iron-deficient group (NON); 2) control group (CON), intramuscularly injected with iron dextran (100 mg Fe) on PD2; 3) moderate iron group (MOD), orally administered ferrous sulfate at 10 mg Fe · kg body wt-1 · d-1; and 4) high iron group (HIG), orally administered ferrous sulfate at 50 mg Fe · kg-1 · d-1. Piglets were nursed by sows during the study from PD1 to PD21. Tissue iron was analyzed by atomic absorption spectrophotometry. Messenger RNA and protein expression of iron regulator and transporters were analyzed by quantitative reverse transcriptase-polymerase chain reaction and Western blot. A sociability test was performed on PD19-20.Results: Both MOD and HIG treatments (5.51 and 9.85 µmol/g tissue), but not CON (0.54 µmol/g), increased hepatic iron as compared with NON (0.25 µmol/g, P < 0.05). Similarly, the hippocampal iron concentrations in the MOD and HIG groups were 14.9% and 31.8% higher than that of NON, respectively (P < 0.05). In comparison with NON, MOD and HIG treatment repressed DMT1 in duodenal mucosa by 4- and 46-fold, respectively (P < 0.05); HIG drastically induced HAMP in liver by 540-fold (P < 0.05); iron-supplemented groups reduced TFRC in the hippocampus by <1-fold (P < 0.05). However, duodenal expression of ferroportin, the predominant transporter in basal membrane, was not affected by treatment. Despite normal sociability, the MOD and HIG pigs displayed deficits in social novelty recognition (P = 0.004).Conclusions: Duodenal ferroportin was hyporesponsive to iron excess (MOD and HIG), which caused hippocampal iron overload and impaired social novelty recognition in nursing pigs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Fruit, vegetable, meat, and dairy food waste were collected from supermarkets and enzymatically digested to generate food waste products, containing 90% smaller particles of food waste (SPFW) and 10% larger particles of food waste (LPFW). The objectives of this experiment were to determine the chemical composition of the enzymatically digested food waste products and to evaluate if these products may be used in diets for growing-finishing pigs. On average, SPFW contained 220.5 g/kg dry matter (DM), whereas LPFW contained 289.8 g/kg DM. On a DM basis, SPFW contained 220.5 g/kg crude protein, 365.8 g/kg crude fat, 4.8 g/kg Ca, and 3.3 g/kg P. Larger particle food waste contained 195.3 g/kg crude protein, 344.3 g/kg crude fat, 26.9 g/kg Ca, and 11.2 g/kg P. On a DM basis, total indispensable amino acids were 100.7 g/kg in SPFW and 79.9 g/kg in LPSF, whereas total dispensable amino acids were 117.6 g/kg in SPFW and 95.7 g/kg in LPSF, respectively. A relatively high variability was observed in concentrations of minerals and fiber among batches of LPFW than SPFW. Fifty-six crossbred pigs (approximately 32.99 kg initial body weight (BW)) were randomly allotted to one of 2 dietary treatments with 7 replicate pens per treatment and 4 pigs per pen (2 barrows and 2 gilts). A 3-phase feeding program was used with day 0 to 28 as phase 1, d 28 to 53 as phase 2, and d 53 to 79 as phase 3. The 2 dietary treatments were a control diet based on corn and soybean meal and a liquid diet with the mixture of SPFW and LPFW (90:10, vol:vol). In phases 1 and 2, pigs were fed control or liquid diets, whereas all pigs were fed the control diet in phase 3. Compared with the control diet, pigs fed the liquid diet had lower ( P < 0.05) body weights throughout the experiment due to reduced ( P < 0.05) DM intake. Pigs fed the liquid diet tended to have increased ( P  = 0.082) gain:feed in phase 3. In conclusion, the enzymatically digested food waste may provide nutrients on a DM basis that are close to the nutrient content in a corn-soybean meal diet fed to growing-finishing pigs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]