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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Vet. Sci.
Sec. Animal Nutrition and Metabolism
Volume 11 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/fvets.2024.1508048
This article is part of the Research Topic Natural Compounds/Products and Livestock Productivity: Enhancing Antioxidant Levels, Gut Health, Mitigating Greenhouse Gas Emissions, and Disease Control View all 14 articles

Effects of Gynura procumbens extract supplementation on growth performance, carcass traits, antioxidant capacity, immunity and quality of meat ducks

Provisionally accepted
Xiaolian Chen Xiaolian Chen *Gaoxiang Ai Gaoxiang Ai Pingwen Xiong Pingwen Xiong Jiang Chen Jiang Chen Wenjing Song Wenjing Song Qiongli Song Qiongli Song Chuanhui Xu Chuanhui Xu Weide Su Weide Su Zhiheng Zou Zhiheng Zou Qipeng Wei Qipeng Wei
  • Institute of Animal Husbandry and Veterinary Medicine, Jiangxi Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Nanchang, China

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Gynura procumbens (Lour.) Merr is a common traditional Chinese medicine with anti-tumor, anti-inflammatory and antioxidant activities. However, no related studies reported the potential application effect of Gynura procumbens on meat ducks. The study aims to investigate the potential effects of Gynura procumbens extract (GPE) supplementation on growth performance, carcass traits, antioxidant capacity, immunity and meat quality. A total of 480 21-day-old female healthy ducks were randomly allocated to four treatments, each treatment containing six replicates with twenty ducks per replicate. The groups received a corn-soybean basal diet supplemented with 0 mg/kg GPE (CON), 200 mg/kg GPE (GPE200), 400 mg/kg GPE (GPE400), and 600 mg/kg GPE (GPE600), respectively. The entire experiment lasted for 7 weeks. The results showed that dietary supplementation with 600 mg/kg GPE significantly reduced the contents of serum urea nitrogen, triglyceride (TG) and total cholesterol (TC). GPE (200, 400 and 600 mg/kg) supplementation effectively reduced the contents of IL-2 and MDA. The levels of immunoglobulin M (IgM) as well as total antioxidative capacity (T-AOC) in GPE600 group dramatically elevated in comparison with the control group.Dietary GPE supplementation considerably increased the moisture content of the breast muscle. Furthermore, dietary supplementation with GPE markedly decreased the water loss rate and shear force. In conclusion, dietary supplementation with GPE can increase serum total antioxidant capacity, regulate immune function and improve meat quality to some extent in meat ducks. The recommended optimal GPE level in the diet of meat ducks is 600 mg/kg according to the results in this study.

    Keywords: Gynura procumbens extract, Immunity, antioxidant, meat quality, Meat ducks

    Received: 08 Oct 2024; Accepted: 22 Nov 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Chen, Ai, Xiong, Chen, Song, Song, Xu, Su, Zou and Wei. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Xiaolian Chen, Institute of Animal Husbandry and Veterinary Medicine, Jiangxi Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Nanchang, China

    Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.