BACKGROUND: Pre-pubertal nutrition managements are considered essential for animal health, optimizing production and reproductive performance in livestock. OBJECTIVES: In this study, the effects of dietary low and high energy and protein provisions on body growth, blood metabolites and inherent safety index were investigated in pre-pubertal Kurdish female lambs. METHODS: We fed 40 healthy Kurdish female lambs (30±8.6 days old and weighing 10.2±3.4 kg) were randomly divided into one of two experimental diets in pre-weaning period: high energy and protein (HEP, 2.50 Mcal ME/kg dry matter (DM) and 148 g CP/kg DM) or low energy and protein (LEP, 2.02 Mcal ME/kg DM and 87 g CP/kg DM). At the time of weaning, one half of lambs from each group was randomly separated and assigned to HEP or LEP. So there were four treatment groups in post-weaning period: H-H (HEP pre- and post-weaning); H-L (HEP pre-weaning and LEP post-weaning); L-H (LEP pre-weaning and HEP post-weaning) and L-L (LEP pre and post-weaning, control group). Treatment effects on dry matter intake, milk intake, serum metabolite profiles, inherent safety index and growth were examined. RESULTS: Pre-pubertal plane were significantly affected above mention parameters at post- weaning period (P<0.05). In the post-weaning period, dietary treatment did significantly decrease affect all blood metabolites concentration (P<0.05) expect calcium levels. The numbers of white blood cell, neutrophil, lymphocytes and monocytes of H-L treatment were higher than other groups (P<0.05). CONCLUSIONS: It has been observed that diet energy and protein and body energy reserves are much important regulators of growth and health indicators in Kurdish female lambs.

Background: Organic acids and their salts are known as appropriate substitutes in feed for improving the health, growth, and performance of fish. Objectives: The present study was conducted to determine the effects of dietary lactic acid supplementation on immunological factors, hepatic enzyme activity, and plasma proteins in common carp, Cyprinus carpio. The fish were fed the diets mentioned above for 56 days, then their growth performance, humoral immunity, and plasma hepatic enzymes were assessed.Methods: A total of 180 fish (mean weight=25 g) were randomly distributed in twelve tanks (150 L water in each tank) as four treatments, fed diets containing 0, 2.5, 5, and 10 g/kg lactic acid (T0, T1, T2, and T3, respectively).Results: At the end of the feeding trial, T2 showed significantly higher growth performance than T0. Plasma total protein, albumin, and globulin levels of T1-T3 were significantly higher than that of T0. However, plasma protein levels decreased significantly by elevation in dietary lactic acid concentration (10 g/kg). No significant differences were observed in plasma aspartate aminotransferase (AST) and alkaline phosphatase (ALP) activity among the treatments, although alanine aminotransferase (ALT) activity decreased significantly in fish-fed dietary lactic acid supplementation (T1-T3) compared with the control group (T0). All humoral immunity parameters (lysozyme, complement, immunoglobulin, and bactericidal activity) increased significantly in T1-T3 treatments compared to the T0 group.Conclusion: Overall, dietary lactic acid supplementation improves growth performance, humoral immunological parameters, and hepatic health. According to the results, dietary lactic acid (2.5-5 g/kg) is recommended for preparing common carp feed.

Background: Major histocompatibility complex (MHC) is one of the best characterized genetic regions controlling immune responses against vaccines. Identifying the association between MHC haplotypes and improved immune responses would be useful in genetic breeding strategies in animals. OBJECTIVES: MHC class II B genetic diversity and its association with humoral immune responses against Newcastle vaccine (NDV) were evaluated in commercial turkey poults (meleagris gallopavo). METHODS: A total of 92 turkey poults were vaccinated with live VG/GA strain of Newcastle disease vaccine at age of 10 and 20 days. Serum NDV specific IgY was assessed by indirect enzyme linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) and MHC II B polymorphism was determined using high resolution melting curve (HRM) technique and DNA sequencing method. Effects of alleles on humoral immune responses were evaluated by multivariate regression analysis and GLM procedures. RESULTS: A total of 8 HRM profiles and 10 alleles were identified in this population. B1-1*3, B1-1*4 and B1-1*5 alleles were significantly associated with lower antibody responses against vaccine in commercial turkey poults. CONCLUSIONS: Three alleles reported in this study were associated with reduced immune responses against NDV vaccine in turkey population. Due to such negative associations, molecular breeding programs based on specific genetic markers should be implemented with great caution.

Decision making for sustainable development must be reviewed based on the new insights into Infection and immunity and the impacts of mathematical modeling on vaccination and disease control. Regarding to important role of immune genes in disease resistance and controlling production traits, immunogenetics parameters should be considered in modeling for disease control. Investigating the polymorphism as well as associations and linkages to traits in native animals, as a genetic resource of our country, would be worthwhile and can be used in future native breeding programs.Decision making for sustainable development must be reviewed based on the new insights into Infection and immunity and the impacts of mathematical modeling on vaccination and disease control. Regarding to important role of immune genes in disease resistance and controlling production traits, immunogenetics parameters should be considered in modeling for disease control. Investigating the polymorphism as well as associations and linkages to traits in native animals, as a genetic resource of our country, would be worthwhile and can be used in future native breeding programs.

BACKGROUND:Class II transactivator (CIITA) is a dominanttranscriptional element, controlling numerous genes in theimmune system. CIITA is expressed in a constitutive pattern inantigen presenting cells although its expression can occur inother cell types. Since the revelation of CIITA, there have beenconsiderable advances toward understanding its role as anactivator of MHC II genes in humans and mice; nonetheless,there is a lack of published data for this gene in other animals suchas chickens. OBJECTIVES: The goals of this study were todetermine the expression of class II transactivator (CIITA) inchicken and analysis of the CIITA gene sequence between fourIranian indigenous chicken ecotypes. METHODS:After securingthe research accuracy and optimization of reaction conditions,cDNA and DNA samples of gene were obtained from fourIranian indigenous chicken ecotypes. The PCR and RT-PCRproducts were sequenced and the data were analyzed bybioinformatics software. RESULTS: Comparison of thesequencing results with the reference sequence of the red junglefowl revealed that these sequences belonged to the predictedCIITA gene. There was a high conservation rate in the sequenceof CIITA. CONCLUSIONS: Our results indicated that like otherspecies, CIITA is transcripted in chickens' immune system cells.Further studies on chickens must be done to reveal CIITAroles inimmune responses of chickens.