Higher intake of β-glucan impairs reproduction in a female teleost, Tor putitora (Hamilton, 1822)

• Published in: Fish physiology and biochemistry 2024-04, Vol.50 (2), p.589-603
• Main Authors: Ciji, Alexander, Akhtar, M. S., Tripathi, Priyanka H., Dubey, Maneesh Kumar, Sharma, Prakash
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: 17β-Estradiol; Animal Anatomy; Animal Biochemistry; Animal models; Animal Physiology; Aromatase; Biological fertilization; Biomedical and Life Sciences; Diet; Dietary intake; Dietary supplements; Fecundity; Females; Fertilization; Fish; Fish reproduction; Follicles; Food intake; Freshwater & Marine Ecology; Genes; Glucan; Hatching; Histology; Hormones; Life Sciences; Lipids; Liver; Morphology; Ovaries; Plasma; Reproduction; Reproductive failure; Sex hormones; Spawning; Vitellogenin; Zoology; β-Glucan
• ISSN: 0920-1742; 1573-5168
• DOI: 10.1007/s10695-023-01292-4

Although the immuno-modulatory and stress-relieving properties of β-glucan is well elucidated in humans and other animal models, including fish, its role as a dietary supplement on reproduction is extremely scarce. Therefore, in this study, adult female fish were fed one of four test diets having 0 (control), 0.5, 1, and 1.5% β- d -glucan for 130 days and its effect on reproductive performance, ovarian and liver histology, sex hormones, and transcript abundance of selected reproduction-related genes was assessed. Low dietary intake of β-glucan improved fertilization and hatching rates ( p 0.05). Higher intake of β-glucan (1.5%) upregulated aromatase genes without a parallel increase in 17β-estradiol. However, plasma vitellogenin increased with increasing β-glucan up to 1.0% then declined at 1.5% ( p