摘要：AbstractDietary zinc supplementation has been shown to improve piglets’ health. We examined, if the gut epithelialZIP4transporter is affected by the zinc concentration in the diet through epigenetic modifications of theZIP4gene. In an experiment with 30 piglets that were fed diets with 57 (LZn ), 164 (NZn) or 2425 (HZn) mg zinc/kg feed over until four weeks, we found a reduced expression of the gene in the gut epithelium with higher zinc concentration in the feed (P≤ 0.008). The methylation status of two CpGs in exon 2 and intron 2 were decreased in the LZn compared to the NZn group (P≤ 0.01). The increase of the methylation at another CpG in exon 2 led to a decrease of theZIP4mRNA amount (P< 0.05). The fact, that only one CpG had a significant effect onZIP4expression, led us to the assumption that methylation changes play a minor role for the transcriptional regulation ofZIP4.
