Apparent and True Ileal Amino Acid Digestibility in Broiler Chickens fed Wheat Bran-Based Diets Supplemented with Ronozyme® WX (CT)

The study was conducted to evaluate the effects of supplemental ronozyme enzyme on the apparent and true ileal amino acid digestibility of wheat bran fed to broiler chickens. Two hundred and forty (240) one-day-old Abor Acre plus broiler chicks were tagged and randomly allotted into six dietary treatments with five replicates of eight birds per replicate in a completely randomized design. Treatments 1, 2, and 3 contained wheat bran at 10%, 20%, and 30% inclusion level without ronozyme while treatments 4, 5, and 6 contained wheat bran at 10%, 20%, and 30% inclusion level with 2.5g/kg of ronozyme WX (CT) supplementation in a 2×3 factorial arrangement of treatments. Titanium dioxide was added as an indigestible dietary marker at 5g/kg. Birds were fed commercial broiler starter diets from day 1 to day 21 while the experimental diets were fed from day 22 to day 25. On day 26, digesta was sampled from the terminal two-thirds of the ileal section between Meckel’s diverticulum and 2cm anterior to the ileo-caeco-colonic junction. Amino acid analysis of diets and digesta were evaluated using standard procedures. Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics and ANOVA at α0.05. The results show that apparent digestibility coefficients of all the amino acids were similar except for histidine, lysine, methionine, asparagine, glycine, and proline which were significantly (P<0.05) influenced. However, ronozyme supplementation did not remarkably improve the apparent ileal digestibility of amino acids in wheat bran fed to broiler chickens at varying levels. The interaction effect between wheat bran and enzyme was not significant for isoleucine, threonine, and cysteine while interactive effects (P<0.05) were observed in other amino acids. With all three inclusion levels (100, 200, or 300g/kg) of wheat bran, enzyme supplementation significantly (P<0.05) increased phenylalanine (0.87, 0.89, 0.89), alanine (0.91, 0.90, 0.92) and cysteine (0.77, 0.75, 0.76) digestibility coefficients respectively, as compared to those with no enzyme addition. Overall, true ileal amino acid digestibility was significantly (P<0.05) higher for all the amino acids determined except for histidine and cysteine. In conclusion, ronozyme supplementation could be an effective approach to improve amino acid digestibility and utilization of wheat bran in broiler chickens