Many authors have studied the effect of different fat sources in the broilers diet on type of concentration of fatty acid, mainly PUFA in the meat (SANZ et. al 1999; CRESPO, GARCIA 2001, CASTELLINI et. al 2002). However, there are no reports of the effect of levels FA in eggs mineral diet of hens and this study showed the influence of vermiculite supplementation on the fatty acid level of egg`s yolk. The hens have the ability to deposit dietary lipids into the egg yolk and to modify the fatty acid (FA) composition of the egg (CASTELLINI et. al 2002). However, the eggs of hens provided standard feed are poor in linolenic acid (LNA; 18:3n-3) and did not contain eicosapentaenoic (EPA; 20:5n-3) and docosahexaenoic (DHA; 22:6 n-3) fatty acids. The aim of many studies on laying hens was to enrich eggs with n-3 polyunsaturated FA (PUFA) because of their health improving effects on humans. Less research is performed regarding the enrichment of broiler breeder egg. However, it is hypothesized that these n-3 PUFA can express similar health improving effects on the broiler offspring. Increased consumption of n-3 PUFA should benefit heart function, brain development, mental health and prevention of cancer, autoimmune diseases and diabetes (SANZ et. al 2010).
Table 4.
Dietary mineral plus protein sources had a significant effect on the FA profile in yolk (Table 4). Feeding with supplementing diet led to an increase in total FA content, a little changing of level of saturated fatty acids (SFA), increasing dietary mono (MUFA) and polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFA). Regardless of V+FM inclusion levels or combination, contributed to a significant increase in the concentrations of C18:2 n-6 and C18:3 n-3 fatty acids and total PUFAs in yolk lipids. The SFA: palmitic, arachidic acid decreased about 0.1-0.3% while margaric, stearic, docosanoic increased about 0.2×0.5% in group E. Addition of vermiculite increased clearly the level of myristic (C14:0) acid in yolk eggs in group B (0.54%). A slight increase of stearic acid was observed when 5% V was added. No significant difference in palmitic acid content was observed compared with control. When 3% and 5% of V+FM were added, the percentage of 18:1 oleic acid increased (near two times in group D and E). There is no significant increase of 16:1 palmitoleic acid percentage. Similar results were reported by CRESPO AND ESTEVE-GARCI´A (2001). Our data shows that the addition of a natural mineral with fish meal significantly increased in yolk eggs the level of total n-3 fatty acids (Table 4), with this response being primarily related to higher levels of linolenic acid. Similar results were also
reported by SOUZA et al (2008) using fed diets containing microencapsulated fish oil. Fish oil is one of the best known sources of n-3 PUFA, as it is rich in EPA and DHA (MACLEAN et al. 2006). Especially, it is important to note that PUFAs (linoleic acid and alpha-linolenic acid) have displayed protection against lipid per oxidation increasing the levels of several cellular antioxidants such as ascorbic acid, α- tocopherol (CACHALDORA et al. 2008). The linoleic acid significantly increased over tree and four times ore in group C, D and E than in control and B group, and gamma- linolenic seven times higher in group E, which represented a great contribution to the sum of PUFA. Most n-6 polygene fatty acids were noted in the yolk eggs hens fed with the V+FM feed. However, this content was higher in all the experimental groups in comparison to the control group. The results of current study indicated that the FA profile in yolk eggs is customized by a diet with mineral and fishmeal. Feeding with different kinds of diets containing 3% and 5% ratios of vermiculite and fishmeal can be possible to apply in future which was proven by these results including the egg’s yolk level of specific fatty acid or mixture of fatty acids thought to be beneficial to human health (e.g. oleic acid).