Effects of protease supplementation on growth performance, blood constituents, and carcass characteristics of growing-finishing pigs

Abstract

This experiment was conducted to evaluate the effects of dietary protease on growth performance, blood constituents, and carcass characteristics of growing-finishing pigs. A total of 48 growing pigs (initial body weight, 34.8 ± 0.62 kg) were randomly assigned to 2 dietary treatments (6 pigs/pen; 4 replicates/treatment). The treatments were a diet based on corn and soybean meal (CON) and CON supplemented with 0.01 % of protease (PRO). Pigs were fed respective dietary treatments with a 2-phase feeding program for 12 weeks. Pigs fed PRO had higher average daily gain (ADG; phase I, 866.38 vs. 821.75 g/d; overall, 910.96 vs. 866.30 g/d; p < 0.05) and gain to feed ratio (G:F; phase I, 0.345 vs. 0.363 g/g; p < 0.05) than those fed CON. However, there were no differences on blood constituents and carcass characteristics between CON and PRO of growing-finishing pigs. In conclusion, dietary protease supplementation in the typical diet for growing-finishing pigs improved growth rate.

Effects of dietary protease on immune responses of weaned pigs

“…Dietary protease properties include to break down protein-bound complexes with anti-nutritional factors and are typically used in swine and poultry diets as a mono-component or multi-enzyme products [13][14][15]. Several studies showed addition of dietary multi-enzymes with the protease in pig diets improved digestibility of protein and other nutrients as well as growth performance of pigs with different stages of age [15][16][17]. In addition, several recent studies reported dietary protease application as a mono-component in pig diets had positive effects on growth rate, protein digestibility, and gut health of pigs [15,18].…”

Dietary protease improves growth performance, nutrient digestibility, and intestinal morphology of weaned pigs

“…The reason for these observations may be related to the improved nutrient utilization efficiency by addition of PR [25]. However, some studies reported that no positive effects were found on growth performance of growing-finishing pigs by addition of PR [13,26], maybe because of different growth stages of the pigs with different digestive systems [10].…”

“…Dietary protease (PR) is an exogenous enzyme able to degrade proteins and has being widely used in swine diets as a part of multi-enzyme products [10]. Several studies have reported supplementation of enzyme cocktails with protease in swine diets enhanced protein digestion and growth performacnce of weaning, growing, and finishing pigs [11][12][13]. Recent studies also reported addition of PR alone in swine diets impoved gut development and health of weaned pigs by breaking down protein-bound complexes with other ANFs and affected positively nutrient digestibility and growth performace of pigs [9,[11][12][13][14][15].…”

The effect of protease on growth performance, nutrient digestibility, and expression of growth-related genes and amino acid transporters in broilers

“…All of the broiler chick diets were formulated following the nutritional requirements of broilers outlined by the Nutrient Requirements of Poultry [20] ( Table 1). The experimental diets were administered in two phases (phase I from days 0-18 and phase II from days [19][20][21][22][23][24][25][26][27][28][29][30][31][32][33][34][35]. Chicks were raised in a room heated to 33 ± 1℃ for the first 3 days, and the temperature was lowered gradually until the room reached 24℃, maintaining humidity around 60% for the remaining duration the experiment.…”

“…Protease supplementation in poultry diets significantly increased the BWG of broilers over days 1-18 and 19-35, and also during the broiler chicks' overall growth period (d 1-35), as the dietary protease levels increased from 0% to 0.09% (linear; p < 0.05). Additionally, protease supplementation led to significantly lower FCR than compared to the FCR of the CON group, with no supplementation over days [19][20][21][22][23][24][25][26][27][28][29][30][31][32][33][34][35], and also overall (d 1-35; linear; p < 0.05). No difference in FI was observed between the various treatment effects.…”