Investigating the Mechanisms of Lactulose on Gut Health and Uric Acid Metabolism in Geese via Transcriptomics

In recent years, the increasing incidence of goose gout has caused serious economic losses. In this study, we explored the effects of lactulose on intestinal health and uric acid metabolism in geese, and used RNA-seq analysis to reveal its potential mechanism. 180 one-day-old Yangzhou geese were divided into three groups: control group (CG, basal diet), high protein model group (MG, containing 21 % crude protein diet), lactulose group (LS, containing 21 % crude protein diet + 0.3 % lactulose). Results showed that compared with the CG group and MG group, the LS group had significantly lower serum uric acid levels and intact ileal mucosal structure. Through bioinformatics analysis of transcriptome (GO and KEGG enrichment analysis, GSEA and trend analysis), we found key pathways and genes closely related to intestinal health and uric acid metabolism. These key findings include: zinc ion import across plasma membrane biological process, ABC Transporters pathway, Wnt signaling pathway, as well as ABCG2, a key gene for uric acid transport, and genes closely related to intestinal structural integrity (KLF2, LRP6, TJP1, TJP3, PROM1). The results showed that lactulose could effectively reduce the serum uric acid level of geese by improving intestinal morphology. Yangzhou geese were divided into three groups : control group ( CG, basal diet ), high protein model group ( MG, containing 21 % crude protein diet ) and lactulose group ( LS, containing 21 % crude protein diet + 0.3 % lactulose ) for RNA-seq analysis.