Fig. 4

The flow chart of the experimental design and treatment groups. Prenatal diet (the last 6 weeks of gestation, terms = 147 days): NORM (fulfilling 100% of daily energy and protein requirements), LOW (providing 50% of NORM), or HIGH (providing 150% of daily energy and 110% of daily protein requirements). The early postnatal diet (day 3 until 6 months of age): CONV (moderate low fat diet consisting of hay supplemented during the first 8 weeks of life with milk replacer; amounts were adjusted to ensure moderate growth rates of appr. 225 g/d) and HCHF (high-carbohydrate (starch)-high-fat diet consisting of a mix of 37% fat dairy cream with milk replacer in a 1:1 ratio (max. 2½ L/d) supplemented with rolled maize (max. 2 kg/d) and barley straw). The experimental design thus gave rise to six treatment groups: NORM-CONV (N = 9, 5 males:4 females), and NORM-HCHF (N = 9, 6 males:3 females), LOW-CONV (N = 13, 6 males:7 females), LOW-HCHF (N = 13, 5 males:8 females), HIGH-CONV (N = 13, 5 males:8 females), HIGH-HCHF (N = 13, 5 males:8 females)