Physiological and pathological role of Vitamin E and selenium in the animal husbandry and health

As an introduction the author briefly surveys the connections of the feeding nutrition and the diseases, and the komplex defence of the organism against peroxide-burden In case of several vitamins it has been discovered, that in addition to their literal function known up to the present, they have a particular, almost drug-effect in an increased dose. The article introduces the recently discovered immunostimulant role of the carotinoids. The damage of the cell-membrane as a result of lipid-perosidation in the individual organs, or animal spe cies appears in different clinical-pathological diagnoses. There are some of these diseases which could be prevented by giving selenium alone, others could be treated only by dosing selenium and vitamin E together, or solely with feeding vitamin E. The most important diseases belonging to the subject are the reproduction disorders, the deformation of the liver, the blood, the brain, the capillaries and the pancreas, and the myopathies. According to the examinations of REFFETT et al. (1988) the selenium has an immunostimulanl effect - independent of the vitamin E-in marginally supplied calves (0.03 mg/feed kg). In their case the defence has appeared as increased level of glutation-peroxidase and IgM in the plasma following the artificial infection with virus IBR (infectious bovine rhinotracheitis). The feeding of the host animal also directly effects the pathogens. BECK et al. (1995) have inoculated coxsackievirus B3 into mice supplied insufficiently with selenium and/or vitamin E, and the virus has converted into virulent and its generic material has changed in many spots in comparison with the originally inoculated virus. The therapeutic index of the selenium is limited, and even the fivefold of the recommended dose to be mixed into the feed (0.1 ppm) can be toxic. In this way it can cause clinical deformations similar to the foot-and-mouth disease (epizootic stomatitis) on the coronet of pigs.