• Journal of Life Science
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• v.34 no.1
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• pp.18-27
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• 2024

Laying hens are known to be able to 'bio-accumulate' the health-promoting ingredients of their diet into eggs. The purpose of this study was to characterize lignan-rich eggs as functional food fed with Schisandra fruit by-product (SCP). Experimental diets were formulated using yellow corn, rice bran, soybean meal, fish meal, meat bone meal, poultry meal, vitamin premix, mineral premix, CaCO₃, and supplemented Schisandra chinensis by-product. This experiment conducted a completely randomized design with 5 treatments for 5 laying hens. Levels of SCP were fed control diet or each formulated diet containing 1%, 3%, 5% and 7% SCP powder. The weight of eggs and the lignan content in white and yolk of egg were investigated every 7 days. Egg production and egg weight were not affected by diet at less than 5% SCP in the diet, but were significantly reduced when the diet was supplemented with a high concentration of 7% SCP after 3 weeks. Yolks and white in eggs were analyzed by using a high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) to determine the lignans profile. Higher dietary SCP supplementation significantly increased gomisin N and schisandrin C in Acetonitrile (p<0.05). Gomisin N in egg white increased in a concentration-dependent manner, but shisandrin C not detected. These results indicated that the use of SCP powder in layering diets was effective in egg quality and for the production of lignans fortified eggs. In conclusion, dietary supplementation of Schisandra by-product with less than 5% can produce lignans-enrich eggs used as functional foods.