Does Exposure of Broodstock to Dietary Soybean Meal Affect Its Utilization in the Offspring of Zebrafish (Danio rerio)?

SIMPLE SUMMARY: Replacement of fishmeal in fish diets with plant protein has been an ongoing challenge. High-quality plant protein concentrates are widely used since their digestibility can be comparable to fishmeal. However, their price can exceed the cost of marine raw materials. Progress with utilization of lower-quality plant protein sources has been made but a number of concerns must be overcome to maintain acceptable growth rates at high fishmeal substitution levels. Nutritional programming represents a promising approach to offset the negative effects of dietary plant protein through its exposure in early life. We tested an unconventional programming strategy by exposing parental zebrafish to soybean meal diet to improve dietary soybean meal utilization in progeny fish. The study observed a strong trend showing better growth performance between progeny zebrafish fed soybean meal diet that originated from broodstock exposed to soybean meal as opposed to progeny fish fed soybean meal diet that originated from fishmeal diet fed broodstock. However, the study found no changes in the richness, diversity, or composition of gut microbial communities associated with progeny fish from fishmeal or soybean meal fed broodstock. Hence, the mechanism behind nutritional programming does not seem to be associated with modified gut microbiome. ABSTRACT: Nutritional programming (NP) is a concept in which early nutritional events alter the physiology of an animal and its response to different dietary regimes later in life. The objective of this study was to determine if NP via broodstock with dietary plant protein (PP) has any effect on the gut microbiome of the progeny fish and whether this modified gut microbiome leads to better utilization of PP diet. The experiment consisted of four different treatments as follows: (1) progeny that received FM diet obtained from fishmeal (FM)-fed broodstock (FMBS-FM, +control); (2) progeny that received PP diet obtained from FM-fed parents (FMBS-PP); (3) progeny that received PP diet obtained from “nutritionally programmed” parents (PPBS-PP; −control); and (4) progeny that received FM diet obtained from “nutritionally programmed” parents (PPBS-FM). Zebrafish was used as a model species. This study found that parental programming seems to have some positive effect on dietary PP utilization in progeny. However, the influence of NP with PP through broodstock on gut microbiota of the offspring fish was not detected.