Abstract: Purpose: To explore the protective effect of neoagarotetraose against over-exhaustion-induced gut injury by RNA-seq analysis. Methods: Male BALB/c mice were randomly divided into normal control group, over-exhaustion model group (both the groups were gavaged with saline), over-exhaustion plus fructooligosaccharide (FOS) group (positive control), and over-exhaustion plus neoagarotetraose (NAT) group. After sixteen days of administration, colon tissues from the mice in each group were collected, and then RNA was extracted for RNA-seq analysis. Results: Over-exhaustion resulted in significantly increased expression of zinc finger proteins Zfp521 and Zmynd8, associated with inflammation and tumor proliferation (P < 0.01), and significantly reduced expression of tumor suppressors Casz1 and Zfp346 (P < 0.05). NAT could relieve over-exhaustion-induced gut injury by downregulating the expression of zinc finger proteins related to tumor proliferation and upregulating the expression of tumor-suppressing zinc finger proteins. Conclusion: NAT can protect against over-exhaustion-induced gut injury in mice and prevent the occurrence of tumors.

Key words: neoagarotetraose, over-exhaustion, zinc finger protein, RNA-seq, fructooligosaccharide