Metabolical responses and growth of pintado (Pseudoplatystoma corruscans) submitted to sustained exercise

• Grant number: 11/21179-3
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Post-Doctoral
• Start date: March 01, 2012
• End date: February 28, 2014
• Field of knowledge: Agronomical Sciences - Fishery Resources and Fishery Engineering - Aquaculture
• Principal Investigator: Gilberto Moraes
• Grantee: Araceli Hackbarth
• Host Institution: Centro de Ciências Biológicas e da Saúde (CCBS). Universidade Federal de São Carlos (UFSCAR). São Carlos , SP, Brazil

Abstract

Fishes as well as other group of species can accrue benefits from adapting to aerobic exercises. Examples of these benefits are: higher growth and feed conversion rates, less aggressive behavior, and optimization of non-nitrogenous nutrient as source of metabolic energy. This work will be done at the Adaptive Biochemistry Laboratory of freshwater fishes - Federal University of Sao Carlos - and the purpose is to evaluate metabolic and growth responses of pintado (Pseudoplatystoma corruscans) submitted to different exercise regimes. Sixty-four fishes will be divided into four different groups, in which the swimming speed will be: 1BL/sec (1 body length per second), 2BL/sec. and 3 BL/sec.; to the control group no swimming activity will be imposed. The trial period will last 50 days and fish will be fed with commercial diet containing 40% of crude protein, 25% of carbohydrate and 8% of lipid, with 4.000 kcal/kf of gross energy. It will be evaluated the productive performance, intermediary metabolism, digestive capacity of protein and also it will be delineated the metabolic pathways of carbohydrates, lipids and proteins. Results from such work will help to define the better exercise velocity for pintado and allow optimization of future diets. It is also expected the reduction of protein content in the feeding of pintado providing new improvements to the Brazilian managing of fish farming. (AU)