| Summary: | 碩士 === 國立中興大學 === 生命科學系所 === 99 === Silver nanoparticle (AgNP) is a well-characterized antibacterial agent. Our previous studies have shown that the Nanosilicate platelet (NSP) is an ideal dispersant for the fabrication of AgNP to ameliorate the drawback of the self-aggregation of AgNP and silver deposite in applied tissues. AgNP/NSP has shown that effective inhibition of the growth of various pathogens in vitro, including the enteric Gram-nagetive Salmonella. The aim of this study is to evaluate the in vivo antibacterial effect of AgNP/NSP on Salmonella infection in chicks. Salmonella pullorum (S. pullorum) is a highly contagious pathogen, which often causes a high mortality in the infected chicks. In this thesis, we continuously fed new-hatched chicks with S. pullorum by oral administration for six times at 12 hr interval and 0.2 wt% AgNP/NSP was applied once after 6 hr following the secondary administration. The results showed that AgNP/NSP effectively reduced the mortality of chick caused by S. pullorum. In addition, S. typhimurium is another important enteric-pathogen in poultry. We showed that 0.2 wt% AgNP/NSP significantly mitigated the transmission of S. typhimurium from infected gastrointestinal (GI) tract to other internal organs. Notably, AgNP/NSP potentiates the antibacterial effect of amoxicillin on the control of Salmonella infection. Especially, continuous administrations of 1.0 wt% AgNP/NSP for 10 days to chicks did not cause undesired cytopathic effect and silver deposits in the GI tracts. Taken together, these results suggest that AgNP/NSP is a potential therapeutic reagent to control the bacterial infection in GI tract for domestic animals.
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