Article
Analysis of antibiotic resistance genes in pig feces during the weaning transition using whole metagenome shotgun sequencing
Gi Beom Keum1, Eun Sol Kim1, Jin Ho Cho2, Minho Song3, Kwang Kyo Oh4, Jae Hyoung Cho1, Sheena Kim1, Hyeri Kim1, Jinok Kwak1, Hyunok Doo1, Sriniwas Pandey1, Hyeun Bum Kim1,*, Ju-Hoon Lee5,**
1Department of Animal Resources Science, Dankook University, Cheonan 31116, Korea.
2Division of Food and Animal Science, Chungbuk National University, Cheongju 28644, Korea.
3Division of Animal and Dairy Science, Chungnam National University, Daejeon 34134, Korea.
4Microbial Safety Division, National Institute of Agricultural Sciences, Rural Development Administration, Wanju 55365, Korea.
5Department of Food Animal Biotechnology, Department of Agricultural Biotechnology, Center for Food and Bioconvergence, Seoul National University, Seoul 08826, Korea.
**Corresponding Author: Hyeun Bum Kim, Department of Animal Resources Science, Dankook University, Cheonan 31116, Korea, Republic of. Phone: +82-41-550-3653. E-mail:
hbkim@dankook.ac.kr.
**Corresponding Author: Ju-Hoon Lee, Department of Food Animal Biotechnology, Department of Agricultural Biotechnology, Center for Food and Bioconvergence, Seoul National University, Seoul 08826, Korea, Republic of. Phone: +82-2-880-4854. E-mail:
juhlee@snu.ac.kr.
© Copyright 2022 Korean Society of Animal Science and Technology. This is an Open-Access article distributed under the terms of the
Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/) which permits
unrestricted non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any
medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Received: Oct 12, 2022; Revised: Nov 09, 2022; Accepted: Nov 12, 2022
Published Online: Dec 20, 2022
Abstract
Antibiotics have been used in livestock production for not only treatment but also for increasing the effectiveness of animal feed, aiding animal growth, and preventing infectious diseases at the time when immunity is lowered due to stress. South Korea and the EU are among the countries that have prohibited the use of antibiotics for growth promotion in order to prevent indiscriminate use of antibiotics, as previous studies have shown that it may lead to increase in cases of antibiotic-resistant bacteria. Therefore, this study evaluated the number of antibiotic resistance genes in piglets staging from pre-weaning to weaning. Fecal samples were collected from 8 piglets just prior to weaning (21 d of age) and again one week after weaning (28 d of age). Total DNA was extracted from the 200 mg of feces collected from the 8 piglets. Whole metagenome shotgun sequencing was carried out using the Illumina Hi-Seq 2000 platform and raw sequence data were imported to Metagenomics Rapid Annotation using Subsystem Technology (MG-RAST) pipeline for microbial functional analysis. The results of this study did not show an increase in antibiotic-resistant bacteria although confirmed an increase in antibiotic-resistant genes as the consequence of changes in diet and environment during the experiment.
Keywords: antibiotic resistance; whole metagenome shotgun sequencing; pig