The transition from liquid to solid feed during weaning results in morphological, histological and microbial changes in the young animal's intestinal tract and often is associated with diarrhoea. The ban of in-feed antibiotics in pig production in the European Union has led to increasing interest in alternatives to overcome weaning-associated problems. Among others, nucleotides may have the potential to alleviate health impairments due to weaning. Nucleotides are natural components of the non-protein fraction of milk and have important effects on the maintenance of health in young animals. Nucleotides and their related metabolic products play key roles in many biological processes and become essential dietary components when endogenous supply is insufficient for normal function. The present review summarises nucleotide composition of milk from different species, the biology of nucleotides and possible effects of dietary nucleotides on intestinal morphology and function, intestinal microbiota, immune function, nutrient metabolism, hepatic morphology and function as well as growth performance. Special attention is given to data available for pigs, and suggestions are made for inclusion of nucleotides in the diet to benefit piglets' health and reduce the consequences accompanying early weaning.

Conjugated linoleic acids (CLA) have been shown to have anti-carcinogenic, anti-obesity, anti-atherogenic and immunomodulatory functions. The basis for these effects has not been fully explained, but probably involves effects of CLA on eicosanoid metabolism, cytokine production and\or gene expression. The predominant isomer (85–90%) in the natural sources of CLA has the cis-9, trans-11 configuration. As interest in CLA grew and synthetic forms became available, the number of studies examining the effects of dietary CLA in rodents, human subjects and livestock has increased greatly. In the late 1990 s the observation that CLA had anti-obesity effects was reported. Subsequently, it was determined that this effect in mice could be attributed to the trans-10, cw-12 isomer that, along with the cis-9,trans-11 isomer, predominates in the synthetic forms of CLA. The santi-obesity response varies in magnitude depending on species, and has not been consistent in non-rodents. In general, the response is greatest in mice and less or absent in other species. The basis for this lack of consistency is not clear and is unlikely to be accounted for by differences in the source of CLA. In the pig variation in body fat of animals may account for differences in responsiveness. There is no direct evidence of an anti-carcinogenic effect of CLA in human subjects or livestock. Indirect evidence from in vitro studies with cell lines, as well as epidemiological studies, suggest that CLA may be relevant as a natural anti-carcinogen. The immunomodulatory effects of CLA may have application in livestock production as an alternative to the use of feed antibiotics, or as a means of improving the response to vaccination and conferring disease resistance. The recent literature on the effects of CLA, with emphasis on its anti-obesity effects, is reviewed.

An energy system is described in which, in both single-stomachedand ruminant animals, the heat increment of feeding is considered to be linearly related to five measurable quantities. For both kinds of animals there of the quantities, with their heat increments in parentheses, are urinary N(wu;kJ/g),faec alorganic matter (wd; kJ/g) and positive protein retention (wp; kJ/g). Inruminants the other two, with their heat increments in parentheses, are CH4energy (wm; kJ/kJ) and positive lipid retention (w1;kJ/g); in single-stomached animals they are positive lipid retention from feed lipid (wu; kJ/g), and positive lipid retention not from feed lipid (w1; kJ/g). Data from suitable experiments on steers, pig sandchickens were used to test the system and to estimatewu29·2, wd3·80, wp36.5, wm0·616, w116·4 and w114·4. The values for wu, wd, wm and (wI–wII) allow an energy scale, called effective energy, to be defined for both single-stomached animals and ruminants. On this energy scale the values of wp and w1, to gether with the heats of combustion of protein and lipid of 23·8 and 39·6 kJ/g respectively, allow the energyr equirement to be expressed as (MH+ 50 PR+56 LR) for both kinds of animal, where PR and LR are the rates of positive protein an lipid retention (g/d), and MH is the maintenance heat production (kJ/d) which can be estimated as 0·96 of the fast in gheat production. The effective energy (EE) yielded toaruminant animal by a feeding redient can be estimated as EE (MJ/kg organic matter)=1·15 ME–3·84–4·67 DCP, where ME is the metabolizable energy value (MJ/kg organic matter)and DCP is the digested crude protein content (kg/kg organic matter) with both measured at maintenance. Alternatively, EE can be estimated as EE (MJ/kg)=GE (d–0·228)–4·67 DCP, where GE is the gross energy (MJ/kg)and d is the energy digestibility (MJ/MJ) also measured at maintenance. The EE yielded to a single-stomached animal can be estimated as EE(kJ/g)=1·17 ME–4·2 CP–2·44, where ME(kJ/g)is measured at, orcorrected to, zero N-retention and CP (g/g)is the crude protein (N×6·25) content of the feeding redient. The system is simpler for ruminants, and more accurate for both kind soft animal, than those no win use. As effective energy values can be tabulated foring redients, and are additivet othe extent that ME values are additive, they can be used to formul at ediet susing line ar programming.