Distillers dried grains with soluble and enzyme inclusion in the diet effects broilers performance, intestinal health, and microbiota composition

Authors: DAL PONT, GABRIELA - Texas A&M University; BORTOLUZZI, CRISTIANO - Texas A&M University; ROHLOFF, NILTON - Western Paraná State University; FARNELL, YUHUA - Texas A&M University; PILL, RACHEL - Texas A&M University; SUCHODOLSKI, JAN - Texas A&M University; CECCANTINI, MAURCIO - Adisseo France Sas; EYNG, CINTHIA - Western Paraná State University; Kogut, Michael - Mike

Submitted to: Poultry Science
Publication Type: Peer Reviewed Journal
Publication Acceptance Date: 7/25/2023
Publication Date: 8/8/2023
Citation: Dal Pont, G.C., Bortoluzzi, C., Rohloff, N., Farnell, Y., Pill, R., Suchodolski, J., Ceccantini, M., Eyng, C., Kogut, M.H. 2023. Distillers dried grains with soluble and enzyme inclusion in the diet effects broilers performance, intestinal health, and microbiota composition. Poultry Science. Article 102981. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.psj.2023.102981.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.psj.2023.102981

Interpretive Summary: Over the past decade the health of the chick's gut has been recognized as critical to the growth, overall health, and sustainability of chickens in general. To achieve the level of gut health needed to maximize chick growth and poultry meat production, antibiotic growth promoters (AGPs) have historically been employed throughout the industry. However, with the increasing drive to remove AGPs from poultry feed, it has become apparent that alternatives need to be identified. Further, with the removal of AGPs there has been an increase in non-infectious gut inflammation that is affecting poultry health similar to that seen in overweight humans. These experiments were conducted to see if using by-products of distilling grains for liquor called distillers dried grains soluble (DGGS) could replace AGP to help the chicks retain health and peformance traits by helping the health of their gut. We found that inclusion of DGGS in the chick's diet helped their growth and healed their gut from inflammation. Since DGGS is a plentiful by-product of the liquor industry, these results provide evidence that DGGS is a plentiful and inexpensive source of energy that can be utilized in the feed of chickens. These results are very important to the poultry feed industry worldwide since they provide important data for an inexpensive alternative feed source for chickens that helps the young chickens grow and increases the amount of chicken meat available for consumers.

Technical Abstract: This study tested the effect of distillers dried grains with soluble (DDGS) inclusion in a broiler diet, with or without supplementation of exogenous enzymes, on the microbiota composition, intestinal health, diet digestibility and performance. A total of 288 one-day-old chickens was assigned to 6 treatments (8 replicates of 6 birds each) according to a completely randomized design with a 3 x 2 factorial scheme with 3 DDGS levels (0, 7 and 14%) and 2 inclusions of exogenous enzymes (with or without a multi-carbohydrase complex + phytase (MCPC)). The results exhibited that DDGS inclusion up to 14% did not impair broilers performance up to 28 days; however, DDGS-fed animals exhibited significant improvement with the MCPC supplementation. No effects of the enzymes in the ileal digestibility were found at 21 days. DDGS inclusion in the diet affected dry matter and gross energy digestibility. Broilers fed diets with MCPC were found to have less intestinal histological alteration and thus, better gut health. No effect of DDGS, enzyme, or interaction of those were observed for intestinal permeability and in the serum inflammatory biomarker (calprotectin) at 7 and 28 days. The increase of DDGS percentage in the diet reduced the diversity of the ileal microbiota but increased the cecal microbiota diversity. The inclusion of DDGS showed positive effects on microbiota composition due to a reduction of Proteobacteria phylum in the ileum at 28d and a reduction in the presence of Enterococcaceae family in the ileum at 14 and 28d. The inclusion of MCPC complex might promote beneficial changes in the ileal and cecal microbiota and reduce Proteobacteria, Bacillaceae and Enterobacteriaceae. The supplementation of xylanase, ß-glucanase, arabinofuranosidase, and phytase to a DDGS diet improves performance and intestinal health allowing the use of these subproducts in the poultry nutrition.