ACTA VETERINARIA ET ZOOTECHNICA SINICA ›› 2018, Vol. 49 ›› Issue (4): 725-735.doi: 10.11843/j.issn.0366-6964.2018.04.009

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Effects of Wheat Grinding Particle Size in Pellet Diets on Growth Performance and Intestinal Barrier Function of Broilers

DING Xue-mei*, ZHONG Li-mei, LI Dong-dong, ZENG Qiu-feng, ZHANG Ke-ying, BAI Shi-ping, WANG Jian-ping   

  1. Animal Nutrition Institute, Sichuan Agricutural University, Chengdu 611130, China
  • Received:2017-07-26 Online:2018-04-23 Published:2018-04-19

Abstract:

The experiment was conducted to study the effects of wheat grinding particle size in pellet diets on growth performance and intestinal barrier function of broilers. A total of 385 1-day-old AA male broilers were assigned to 5 groups with 7 replicates per group and 11 broilers per replicate. The 5 groups differed only in aperture size of screen surface (2, 4, 6, 8, 10 mm). The diet was wheat-soybean meal diet. The experiment lasted for 42 days, 1 to 21 days and 22 to 42 days stages. On 22 and 43 days of age, one bird per replicate was slaughtered to determine jejunum morphology, the gene expression of ZO-1, occludin, claudin-1 and inflammatory factors in jejunum mucosa, and microbial count in caecum digesta. The results showed that:1) Wheat grinding particle size had significant effect on body weight gain,feed intake and F/G from 1 to 21 days of age (P<0.05),and had a significant quadratic effect on body weight gain and F/G (P<0.05). Wheat grinding particle size had no significant effect on body weight gain and feed intake from 22 to 42 days and 1 to 42 days (P>0.05), but significantly increased F/G and had linearly effect on F/G (P<0.05).2) With the wheat grinding particle size increased, the villus height and villus height/crypt depth significantly increased in jejunum of broilers (P<0.05), and the wheat grinding particle size had a significant quadratic effect on the crypt depth (P<0.05). 3) The relative expression of occludin and IL-4 mRNA were significantly affected by wheat grinding particle size in broilers at 21 d (P<0.05). Wheat grinding particle size had significant linear effect on microbial count in caecum (P<0.05). The count of Lactobacillus increased significantly and the count of Salmonella, Escherichia coli and C.perfringens decreased significantly (P<0.05) with the wheat grinding particle size increasing. In conclusion, the wheat grinding particle size of 580-760 μm (aperture size of screen surface is 4-6 mm)in pellet diet (contain xylanase) is advantageous to growth performance and intestinal barrier function of broilers.

Key words: wheat, grinding particle size, broiler, growth performance, intestinal barrier

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