Determining the impact of commercial feed additives as potential porcine epidemic diarrhea virus mitigation strategies as determined by polymerase chain reaction analysis and bioassay()

Gebhardt, Jordan T; Woodworth, Jason C; Jones, Cassandra K; Tokach, Mike D; Gauger, Philip C; Main, Rodger G; Zhang, Jianqiang; Chen, Qi; DeRouchey, Joel M; Goodband, Robert D; Stark, Charles R; Bergstrom, Jon R; Bai, Jianfa; Dritz, Steve S

Briefly, pigs from each experimental treatment were housed in separate rooms with independent ventilation systems. Rooms had solid flooring that was minimally rinsed to reduce risk of PEDV aerosolization. Pigs were fed liquid milk replacer twice daily and offered a commercial pelleted swine diet ad libitum with free access to water. Each pig was administered 10 mL of the PBS supernatant treatment by orogastric gavage using an 8-gauge French catheter 0 d postbioassay inoculation (dpi). Rectal swabs were collected on d −2, 0, 2, 4, and 6 dpi from all piglets and tested for PEDV RNA via qRT-PCR. Cecal content was collected at necropsy and was evaluated for PEDV genetic material via qRT-PCR.