Evaluation of vitamin B12 on performance and muscle morphometry of broilers

• Grant number: 21/02150-6
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Scientific Initiation
• Start date: June 01, 2021
• End date: May 31, 2022
• Field of knowledge: Agronomical Sciences - Veterinary Medicine
• Principal Investigator: Silvana Martinez Baraldi Artoni
• Grantee: Sheila Carvalho dos Santos
• Host Institution: Faculdade de Ciências Agrárias e Veterinárias (FCAV). Universidade Estadual Paulista (UNESP). Campus de Jaboticabal. Jaboticabal , SP, Brazil

Abstract

For poultry farming, vitamin B12 should be supplemented in diets when they do not contain ingredients of animal origin. This is due to the understanding that higher plants and even fungi do not synthesize this important vitamin for the synthesis of homocysteine, which is linked to the growth factor. The objective of the work is to verify the effect of vitamin B12 on the performance of broilers treated with different concentrations of Vitamin B12. 300 one-day-old Cobb 500® male chicks will be used, distributed in a randomized block design. The birds will be bred in the period of one to 42 days in which food and water will be made available ad libitum. The treatments will be distributed in blocks at random, with 5 treatments with 2 blocks with 3 repetitions. The treatments will consist of two diets, the first will be based on soybean and corn meal with inclusion of 6% meat and bone meal and the second will be based on soybean and corn meal. Treatment 1 will consist of the diet including meat and bone meal and the other treatments will consist of the second diet, T2 without vitamin B12, in treatments 3, 4 and 5 10, 15 and 20 mcg of vitamin B12 will be included. The animals and the leftover feed will be weighed at 7, 21 and 42 days of age to determine weight gain, feed consumption and feed conversion. Macroscopy of the gastrocnemius muscle as well as analysis of cross sections of the middle portion of the muscle by histological analysis. The data will be submitted to ANOVA where the assumptions of homogeneity of variances and normality of errors will be met, and if there is a difference between treatments, the Tukey test will be used for multiple comparisons. For statistical analysis, the software R.