The role of gut microbiota on the protective effects of baicalin
in APEC-induced chicken colibacillosis
Gut microbiota plays a crucial role in herbal medicine therapy, whether
gut microbiota was associated the protective role of baicalin on
APEC-induced chicken colibacillosis was studied in present study.
Treatment of baicalin after APEC infection significantly alleviated the
pathological damages of lung (Fig. 3A), colon, heart, liver, and spleen
pathological injuries see supplementary Fig. S2A), and viscera index
(Table S2), reduced the production of pro-inflammatory cytokines TNF-α,
IL-1β, and IL-6 (Fig. 3B-D and supplementary fig. S2B-D), and bacterial
loads in the lung tissues (Fig. 3E). However, the protective effects of
baicalin on APEC-induced colibacillosis were partly reversed when gut
microbiota was depleted in chicken (Fig. 3A-E and supplementary Fig.
S2A-C and Table S2). Furthermore, detection of the air-blood barrier
permeability showed that depletion of gut microbiota partly counteracted
the increase of the concentration of total protein in BALF (Fig. 3F) and
the expression of tight junction protein including Occludin, claudin-3,
and ZO-1 treated by baicalin (Fig. 3G-I). These results showed that gut
microbiota played an important role on baicalin protects
APEC-induced
colibacillosis.