During pregnancy, the old adage about “eating for two” really isn’t great advice. This is true for humans, but it’s also true for livestock.
Associate professor of animal science at the University of Connecticut, Sarah Reed has received a $499,990 grant from the US Department of Agriculture to try to identify the effects of poor maternal nutrition during pregnancy on sheep offspring. She is specifically interested in better understanding how maternal diet affects offspring growth and metabolism, along with oxidative stress and inflammation. The results that Reed and her team find in sheep are likely to be transferable to other livestock species and even to humans.
It is important that the mother has a healthy and nutritionally appropriate diet, as restricted or over-feeding can have negative impacts on sheep offspring. Nutrient restricted diets during pregnancy can occur in livestock production because of changes in weather patterns and poor pasture quality and/or availability. In contrast, over-feeding can occur due to estimating feed amounts without referring to nutritional requirements.
Knowledge is limited on how changes in inflammation, oxidative stress, and metabolism contribute to altered muscle metabolism in male and female livestock. Since the effects vary depending on the sex of the animal, it is important to determine the immediate and multigenerational impacts of maternal nutrition on the offspring. Along with that, understanding which outcomes are correlated with postnatal growth is critical to their research.
Continue reading at University of Connecticut.
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