Impact of feed additives on surface mucosal health and columnaris susceptibility in channel catfish fingerlings. Ictalurus punctatus

One of the highest priority areas for improvement in aquaculture is the development of dietary additives and formulations which provide for complete mucosal health and protection of fish raised in intensive systems. Flavobacterium columnare, the causative agent of columnaris disease, is among the most prevalent of all freshwater disease-causing bacteria, impacting global aquaculture. We were interested in examining here whether the feeding of a standard catfish diet supplemented with commercial dietary additives, could offer protection against F. columnare mortality. And we conducted RNA-seq for profiling transcriptome expression differences at specific time point between two treatments after F. columnare infection.