Assessing metabolic properties of dairy cows fed low quality straws by integrative arterial and venous metabolomics

Objective: This study was conducted to reveal potential metabolic differences of dairy cows fed corn stover (CS) and rice straw (RS) instead of alfalfa hay (AH) as main forage source. Methods: Thirty multiparous mid-late lactation Holstein dairy cows were selected and randomly assigned to three diets, AH, CS, or RS (n = 10). After 13 weeks of the feeding trial, coccygeal arterial and superficial epigastric venous plasma samples were collected before morning feeding for gas chromatography time-of-flight/mass spectrometry analyses. Results: In the artery, 8 and 13 metabolites were detected as differential metabolites between AH and CS, and between AH and RS, respectively. The relative abundance of phenylpropanoate (log₂fold change [FC]) = 1.30, 1.09), panthenol (log₂FC = 2.36, 2.20), threitol (log₂FC = 1.00, 1.07), and 3,7,12-trihydroxycoprostane (log₂FC = 0.79, 0.78) were greater in both CS and RS than in AH, and tyrosine (log₂FC = -0.32), phenylalanine (log₂FC = -0.30), and pyruvic acid (log₂FC = -0.30) were lower in RS than in AH. In the vein, 1 and 7 metabolites were detected as differential metabolites between AH and CS, and between AH and RS, respectively. By comparing AH and RS, we found that metabolic pathways of phenylalanine, tyrosine, and tryptophan biosynthesis and phenylalanine metabolism were enriched by integrative artery and vein analysis. Furthermore, AH and RS, arterial phenylpropanoate and 4-hydroxyproline were positively, and phenylalanine was negatively correlated with milk urea nitrogen. Finally, in AH and CS, arterial panthenol was negatively correlated with feed efficiency. Conclusion: Arterial metabolic profiles changed more than those in the veins from animals on three forage diets, differing in amino acids. We found that phenylalanine, tyrosine, and tryptophan biosynthesis and phenylalanine metabolism were restricted when cows were fed low-quality cereal straw diets.