Effect of replacing choline chloride with vegetable choline in a high-carbohydrate diet on the health of Nile tilapia

• Grant number: 24/14237-7
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Scientific Initiation
• Start date: October 01, 2024
• End date: September 30, 2025
• Field of knowledge: Agronomical Sciences - Animal Husbandry - Animal Nutrition and Feeding
• Principal Investigator: Leonardo Susumu Takahashi
• Grantee: Lyvia Canuto de Oliveira
• Host Institution: Centro de Aquicultura (CAUNESP). Universidade Estadual Paulista (UNESP). Campus de Jaboticabal. Jaboticabal , SP, Brazil

Abstract

Carbohydrate is an important non-protein energy source in fish feed, but diets high in carbohydrates cause metabolic disorders that affect intestinal health and contribute to a suppressed immune system. Choline has important functions in energy metabolism and acts as a hepatoprotector. However, the widely used form is choline chloride, which has low bioavailability and high hygroscopicity, which when mixed with other ingredients in feed formulation, impacts the availability of other nutrients. Therefore, the aim of the study is to investigate the replacement of choline chloride with vegetable choline on the health of Nile tilapia fed high carbohydrate. The experiment will be conducted in a completely randomized design with seven treatments and four replications. Treatments include: basal diet containing à 38% carbohydrate (without choline chloride or vegetable choline); basal diet supplemented with 1200 mg/kg of choline from choline chloride; basal diet with supplementation of 600 mg/kg of choline from choline chloride and 600 mg/kg of choline from vegetable choline; basal diet with supplementation of 1,200 mg/kg of choline from vegetable choline; basal diet supplemented with 800 mg/kg of choline from vegetable choline; basal diet with supplementation of 600 mg/kg of choline from vegetable choline and basal diet with supplementation of 400 mg/kg of choline from vegetable choline. The fish will receive the experimental diets three times a day, until apparent satiety, for 60 days. After the experimental period, three fish per aquarium (n=12) will be anesthetized with benzocaine for blood withdrawal by caudal puncture for hematological analysis. The same fish will be sacrificed with a lethal dose of benzocaine to remove the intestine, in which digestive enzymes and morphology will be analyzed. The data will be analyzed by one-way ANOVA using the Rstudio program.