• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
• /
• 제17권8호
• /
• pp.1145-1149
• /
• 2004

Immunomodulatory feed additives might offer alternatives to antimicrobial growth promoters in poultry production. This experiment was carried out to test the effect of $\beta$-glucan supplementation on the growth performance and immune response in broilers. Total of 160 day-old broilers were randomly assigned to 4 treatment groups fed corn-soybean diets containing 0, 0.012, 0.025 or 0.05% of $\beta$-glucan supplement in a 6 week feeding experiment. Growth performance, antibody titer against New Castle vaccine, lymphocyte blastogensis, and peritoneal macrophage chemotaxis activity of broilers were evaluated. Results showed that there were no significant differences in weight gain and feed efficiency among the treatments, and no differences in antibody titer was observed. Supplementation of $\beta$-glucan did not elevate the lymphocyte blastogensis among treatments, following stimulation with different mitogens. However, supplementation with 0.025 and 0.05% $\beta$-glucan enhanced the macrophage chemotaxis activity of broilers. These results suggest that $\beta$-glucan may enhance some cell-mediated immune responses of chickens by modulate macrophages ability.

• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
• /
• 제16권8호
• /
• pp.1151-1157
• /
• 2003

The surfactant Tween 80 was evaluated for its ability to influence cumulative gas production, cellulose digestion, and enzyme activities by mixed ruminal microorganisms grown on barley grain or Orchardgrass hay. The addition of Tween 80 at a level of 0.10% significantly (p<0.05) decreased the cumulative gas production rate from both barley grain or Orchardgrass hay substrates. However, 0.05% Tween 80 did not affect gas production rates compared to the control treatment. The addition of 0.05% Tween 80 to cultures growing on barley grain resulted in a significant increase in cellulase (90.01%), xylanase (90.73%) and amylase (487.25%) activities after 30 h incubation. Cultures utilizing Orchardgrass hay had a significant increase in cellulase (124.43%), xylanase (108.86%) and amylase (271.22%) activities after 72 h incubation. These increases in activities were also observed with cultures supplemented with 0.10% Tween 80 throughout all the incubation times tested. These results indicated that the addition of 0.05% Tween 80 could greatly stimulate the release of some of key enzymes without decreasing cell growth rate in contrast to trends reported with aerobic microorganism. Our data indicates potential uses of the surfactant Tween 80 as a feed additive for ruminant animals.

• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
• /
• 제24권2호
• /
• pp.295-302
• /
• 2011

Almost half of New Zealand's greenhouse gas emissions arise from agriculture and enteric methane ($CH_4 $) emissions arising from ruminant animals constitute 30% of total $CO_2$-e emissions. Enteric $CH_4$ emissions have increased by 9% since 1990. Extensive research has been undertaken to develop reliable methods for measuring enteric $CH_4$ emissions. New Zealand studies using the SF6 tracer technique suggest that on average this technique yields similar values to the 'gold' standard of calorimetry, but with a larger variance. National inventory estimates based on results obtained using the $SF_6$ technique will therefore overestimate the uncertainty. Mitigating emissions can be achieved by changing feed type but there are practical and cost barriers to the use of alternative feeds. Forages containing condensed tannins do reduce emissions but are agronomically inferior to the forages currently used. Rumen additives have shown some success in-vitro but results from in-vivo trials with both monensin and fumaric acid have been disappointing. The development of methods for directly manipulating rumen microorganisms are at an early stage and work to develop vaccines that can inhibit methanogenesis has yielded mixed results. The successful identification of sheep with contrasting $CH_4$ yields raises the possibility that, in the long term, a breeding approach to $CH_4$ mitigation is feasible.

• Journal of Animal Science and Technology
• /
• 제61권3호
• /
• pp.122-137
• /
• 2019

Methane, one of the important greenhouse gas, has a higher global warming potential than that of carbon dioxide. Agriculture, especially livestock, is considered as the biggest sector in producing anthropogenic methane. Among livestock, ruminants are the highest emitters of enteric methane. Methanogenesis, a continuous process in the rumen, carried out by archaea either with a hydrogenotrophic pathway that converts hydrogen and carbon dioxide to methane or with methylotrophic pathway, which the substrate for methanogenesis is methyl groups. For accurate estimation of methane from ruminants, three methods have been successfully used in various experiments under different environmental conditions such as respiration chamber, sulfur hexafluoride tracer technique, and the automated head-chamber or GreenFeed system. Methane production and emission from ruminants are increasing day by day with an increase of ruminants which help to meet up the nutrient demands of the increasing human population throughout the world. Several mitigation strategies have been taken separately for methane abatement from ruminant productions such as animal intervention, diet selection, dietary feed additives, probiotics, defaunation, supplementation of fats, oils, organic acids, plant secondary metabolites, etc. However, sustainable mitigation strategies are not established yet. A cumulative approach of accurate enteric methane measurement and existing mitigation strategies with more focusing on the biological reduction of methane emission by direct-fed microbials could be the sustainable methane mitigation approaches.

• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
• /
• 제14권4호
• /
• pp.540-547
• /
• 2001

An experiment was conducted to investigate the effects of environmentally friendly agents (yucca extract, mineral feed additive, acidifier, nonspecific immunostimulating anionic alkali solution) on the growth performance, nutrient digestibility, nutrient excretion and carcass characteristics in growing-finishing pigs. A total of 125 pigs were allotted into 5 treatments with 5 replications, 5 pigs per pen in a completely randomized block design. Dietary treatments consisted of 1) control: basal diet, 2) YE: basal diet+120 mg/kg of yucca extract, 3) MFA: basal diet+50 mg/kg of mineral feed additive, 4) NIS: basal diet+3% of NIS (nonspecific immunostimulating anionic alkali solution), and 5) Acidifier: basal diet+0.5% of acidifier (organic acid complex). During the growing phase of the feeding trial, There were no significant differences in average daily feed intake (ADFI) and feed conversion ratio (F/G) among treatments, but the Acidifier group showed higher average daily gain (ADG) than the MFA group (p<0.05). During the finishing phase, there were no significant differences in growth performance among treatments, however YE supplementation increased ADG and F/G by 3.1 and 6.15%, respectively, when compared to control group. Proximate nutrients (dry matter, DM; crude protein, CP; crude ash, CA; crude fat, CF; gross energy, GE; calcium, Ca and phosphorus, P) digestibility did not show any significant differences among the treatments. And there were no significant differences in DM, N and P excretion as well. The supplementation of environmentally friendly agents tended to increase carcass weight compared to control group. Pigs fed MFA showed significantly heavier (p<0.05) carcass weight than those fed control or Acidifier diets. Addition of these agents except for NIS to diet for growing-finishing pigs caused a similar feed cost/kg weight gain than control group. Therefore, present study suggested that the optimum environmentally friendly agent would be yucca extracts, considering the effects on growth performance, nutrient digestibility, nutrient excretion, carcass characteristics and feed cost in growing-finishing pigs.

• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
• /
• 제29권12호
• /
• pp.1734-1741
• /
• 2016

This study was conducted to examine the effects of adding phytoncide oil extracted from Korean pine nut cone by-product to the diet of dairy cows on milk yield and compositions, fatty acid characteristics, complete blood count and stress response. A total of 74 Holstein cows were used for 30 days and divided into two groups. Each group was given a basal diet (C) or an experimental diet containing phytoncide additives at 0.016% (T) in feed. The results showed that phytoncide feeding had no effect on milk yield. In addition, there were no observed effects on milk composition, but the ratio of fatty acid in milk was significantly affected by the phytoncide diet, and it showed a positive effect. Not only were the major functional fatty acids, conjugated linoleic acid and eicosapentaenoic acid increased, but also ${\omega}6:{\omega}3$ fatty acid ratio was reduced in milk of T group (p<0.05). In blood analysis, the complete blood count showed no significant difference between C and T group on all parameters. However, the cortisol concentration was significantly decreased in T group compared to control (p<0.05). Taken together, we suggest that phytoncide oil does not have a great influence on the physiological changes, but can be a potential feed additive that improves the milk fatty acid and stress resilience in dairy cows. In addition, it will contribute to the development of feed resource, a reduction in feed cost and a lessening of environmental pollution.

• 농업과학연구
• /
• 제43권1호
• /
• pp.14-20
• /
• 2016

One of the most powerful health management practices is the use of antibiotics, but their use is being restricted because of health safety issues. The swine industry has been looking for various alternatives to antibiotics and increasingly considers the use of dietary factors like feed ingredients, feed additives, feed formulation practices, or feeding methods, instead of using antibiotics to improve pig health and performance. Among other alternatives to antibiotics, spray-dried plasma may be a candidate. Spray-dried plasma is a blood product that provides bioavailable nutrients and physiologically active components such as immunoglobulins, glycoproteins, growth factors, peptides, etc. It is an excellent protein source with balanced and highly digestible amino acids. Several beneficial physiological activities depend on components of spray-dried plasma, such as immune competence (antibacterial activity), modulation of microbiota and/or immune system, integrity of intestinal barrier function, etc. These beneficial effects can contribute to improvement of pig performance and health by modulation of microbiota in the digestive tract and/or immune system. Therefore, it is suggested that spray-dried plasma has great potential as an antibiotics alternative.

• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
• /
• 제24권7호
• /
• pp.1001-1006
• /
• 2011

To determine the efficiency of copper (Cu) supplementation, a feeding experiment was carried out with 240 day old broiler chicks (vencobb-100). Birds were divided into four dietary treatments: i) C - no additives, ii) $T_1$-75 mg inclusion of Cu/kg diet, iii) $T_2$-150 mg inclusion of Cu/kg diet, iv) $T_3$-250 mg inclusion of Cu/kg diet. The present study was carried out in the Department of Animal Physiology, West Bengal University of Animal and Fishery Sciences, Kolkata, India for a period of 42 days (6 weeks). Growth performance was measured in terms of live weight gain, cumulative feed intake and feed conversion ratio at the end of $21^{st}$ and $42^{nd}$ day of the experiment and the result was found to be encouraging for commercial enterprises when the chickens were fed at 150 mg Cu/kg ($T_2$) of their diet. Excess dietary copper more than 150 mg/kg reduced the haemoglobin (Hb) concentration in blood and resulted in the accumulation of copper in the liver with decreased blood Hb concentration and packed cell volumes (PCV). Copper supplementation increased the total erythrocyte count (TEC) as copper is involved in erythropoiesis. But, from the result it is indicated that the dietary copper concentration could not alter the total leukocyte count (TLC). In case of different leucocytes count (DLC), there were no significant differences observed among the different treated groups. Statistical analysis showed significant (p<0.01) difference in plasma concentration of copper, zinc, ferrous and cholesterol among the different copper treated groups. The result indicates that supplementation of copper is an effective way of improving the production performance and haematological parameters in broiler chicken.

• International Journal of Industrial Entomology and Biomaterials
• /
• 제31권2호
• /
• pp.75-78
• /
• 2015

The white-spotted chafer, Protaetia brevitarsis (Coleoptera: Scarabaeidae), is an economically important insect in Korea. Traditionally, it has been regarded as a medicine for preventing liver-related diseases and suppressing liver cancer. Recently, this beetle was enlisted as a temporal food ingredient by Korean Ministry of Food and Drug Safety. Therefore, this beetle is focused as a one of the important insects that are commercially reared and sold in Korea. As the economic importance of this beetle is growing, the suitable rearing conditions are needed for more detailed investigation. In this study, we compared three temperature conditions and two food additives, rice chaff and soybean cake, for its effects on the body weight change of third instar larvae of P. brevitarsis. Temperature is a major environmental factor that has tremendous effects on rearing insects. In additions, rice chaff and soybean cake are byproducts of other agricultural activities. Therefore, it is easy to get, and the price is comparatively low. However, they still have meaningful amount of nutrients. With four different kinds of feed and three temperature conditions on the third instar larvae of beetles, the body weight change was tracked for 14 wk. We concluded that 27.5℃ is the optimal temperature to rear the third instar larvae among three temperatures (25, 27.5, and 30℃). Among four different feeds, conventional fermented oak saw dust with rice chaff and soybean cake was the best feed for larval weight gain during 14 wk. However, feed with soybean cake at 30 ℃ was the best condition for rearing P. brevitarsis larvae when temperatures and feeds were compared at the same time.

• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
• /
• 제14권12호
• /
• pp.1752-1757
• /
• 2001

The present study was conducted to assess the dietary effect of T-2 toxin on the antioxidant systems of the liver in growing quail and to comparatively evaluate the protective properties of two different mycotoxin-adsorbent additives, Mycosorb and zeolite, in preventing inhibition of the antioxidant system. Four groups of 4 day old quail were formed with 20 birds in each group. The birds were maintained on the floor for the course of the study. The three treatment diets consisted of the basal diet with T-2 toxin added in the form of Fusarium sporotrichioides culture (8.1 mg/kg feed), T-2 toxin (8.1 mg/kg) plus zeolite (30 g/kg feed), and T-2 toxin (8.1 mg/kg) plus Mycosorb (1 g/kg feed). After 30 days of feeding (34 days old) all birds were sacrificed and liver samples for biochemical analyses were collected from five quail in each of the four groups. Antioxidant concentrations were evaluated by HPLC-based methods. Inclusion of T-2 toxin in the quail diet was associated with a significant (p<0.05) decrease in concentrations of all forms of antioxidants studied, including ${\alpha}$- and ${\gamma}$-tocopherols, ascorbic acid, retinol and retinyl esters. At the same time, liver susceptibility to lipid peroxidation significantly (p<0.05) increased. Inclusion of zeolite in the quail diet at the level of 3% was ineffective in preventing antioxidant depletion in the liver by mycotoxicosis. In contrast, Mycosorb in the diet at a 0.1% level was able to significantly inhibit liver antioxidant depletion and as a result decreased lipid peroxidation in the liver. Concentrations of all forms of antioxidants studied were significantly higher in the livers of the quails fed the basal and T-2 toxin/Mycosorb combination in comparison to birds fed the basal with T-2 toxin alone.