Y+Health: Effects of Ygeia+ on the European seabass immune response and disease resistance: New tools and opportunities

The concept of maintaining animal health through the best possible nutrition is well-accepted in modern animal farming. Indeed, effective and sustainable disease prevention using vaccines has been an important factor for the successful growth of aquaculture, but nutritional modulation of vaccine efficacy presents itself as an attractive strategy for fish farmers to enhance and extend protection against disease. The main goal of the present project is to provide a better understanding of the underpinning immune machinery of fish fed Ygeia+, and to deliver new knowledge on Ygeia+ capacity to improve vaccine efficiency in the European seabass (Dicentrarchus labrax).
The Y+Health team will use an innovative multidisciplinary approach that aims to explore the links between nutrition and immune plasticity. Underlying mechanisms will be addressed by localising key elements of the immune response and inflammation in the head-kidney and blood.
Additionally, peripheral changes in European seabass submitted to inflammatory insults will be studied in the liver. An innovative approach will assess Ygeia+ ability to improve disease resistance in vaccinated fish while changes in cell-mediated immunity and genes involved in leucocytes migration and antigen recognition will be followed.
This project would allow the understanding of Ygeia+ mode-of-action and may propose new applications in fish health management.