(Press-News.org) URBANA - Inclusion of corn germ in swine diets can reduce diet costs, depending on the local cost of corn germ and other ingredients. Recent research conducted at the University of Illinois indicates that corn germ can be included at up to 30 percent in diets fed to growing pigs.
"In previous research, we had seen that pigs do very well on diets containing 10 percent corn germ, so we wanted to investigate if higher inclusion rates can be used," said Hans Stein, professor of animal sciences at Illinois.
The corn germ used in this study came from the ethanol, or dry grind, industry, and contained 16 to 18 percent fat. This product is different from the corn germ produced from the wet milling industry, which contains 30 to 40 percent fat.
Stein's team tested diets containing 0 percent, 10 percent, 20 percent, and 30 percent corn germ. They tested each inclusion level of corn germ in diets containing 30 percent distillers dried grains with solubles (DDGS) as well as in diets containing no DDGS. They found no difference in growth performance, carcass composition, muscle quality, or backfat quality as increasing amounts of corn germ were added to the diets, regardless of the inclusion level of DDGS.
"The results of this work demonstrate that pig growth rate will not be changed by the inclusion of up to 30 percent corn germ in the diets, and feed conversion rate will not be changed," Stein said.
All diets contained the same amounts of energy, standardized ileal digestible indispensable amino acids, and digestible phosphorus. Fat content was not held constant across diets; the diets containing more corn germ also contained more fat. As a result, the bellies of pigs fed diets with no DDGS were softer as corn germ levels increased.
"Producers may have to reduce the inclusion rate during the final three to four weeks before slaughter," Stein concluded. There was no effect on belly firmness in pigs fed diets containing DDGS.
Stein said that research on whether reducing the inclusion rate of corn germ in late-finishing diets would ameliorate the negative effects on belly quality might be warranted.
###
The study, "Up to 30 percent corn germ may be included in diets fed to growing–finishing pigs without affecting pig growth performance, carcass composition, or pork fat quality," was published in the Journal of Animal Science and was co-authored with Jung Wook Lee, a Master's student in the Stein Monogastric Nutrition Laboratory at Illinois, and Floyd McKeith, professor of animal sciences at Illinois. The manuscript is available at http://journalofanimalscience.org/content/90/13/4933.full.
Feeding corn germ to pigs does not affect growth performance
2013-04-01
ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:
Watching fluid flow at nanometer scales
2013-04-01
CAMBRIDGE, MA -- Imagine if you could drink a glass of water just by inserting a solid wire into it and sucking on it as though it were a soda straw. It turns out that if you were tiny enough, that method would work just fine — and wouldn't even require the suction to start.
New research carried out at MIT and elsewhere has demonstrated for the first time that when inserted into a pool of liquid, nanowires — wires that are only hundreds of nanometers (billionths of a meter) across — naturally draw the liquid upward in a thin film that coats the surface of the wire. The ...
Prostate cancer risk rises in men with inherited genetic condition
2013-04-01
ANN ARBOR, Mich. — Men with an inherited genetic condition called Lynch syndrome face a higher lifetime risk of developing prostate cancer and appear to develop the disease at an earlier age, according to a new study led by researchers at the University of Michigan Comprehensive Cancer Center.
Lynch syndrome is an inherited condition linked to a higher risk of several types of cancer. People with Lynch syndrome have up to 80 percent lifetime risk of colorectal cancer and are also more likely to develop endometrial, gastric, ovarian, urinary tract, pancreatic and brain ...
Mechanism of mutant histone protein in childhood brain cancer revealed
2013-04-01
Most cancer treatments are blunt. In an attempt to eradicate tumors, oncologists often turn to radiation or chemotherapy, which can damage healthy tissue along with the cancerous growths. New research from C. David Allis' laboratory at Rockefeller University may bring scientists closer to designing cancer therapeutics that can target tumors with pinpoint accuracy.
Their findings, published last week in Science Express, follow a recent series of discoveries by several international genome sequencing consortiums that directly links a mutated histone protein to a rare brain ...
Electroencephalography underused investigative tool in hospitals
2013-04-01
Rochester, MN, April 1, 2013 – A retrospective study of patients who had in-hospital electroencephalography (EEG) has established that EEG is a valuable tool that could be deployed more widely to identify treatable causes of impaired consciousness in the hospital setting. The study is published in the April issue of the Mayo Clinic Proceedings.
Altered mental status (AMS) and paroxysmal spells of uncertain origin are common among hospitalized patients. Impaired consciousness can sometimes be linked to metabolic or cardiac causes, but some of these spells may represent ...
Mayo Clinic: New multiple myeloma treatment guidelines personalize therapy for patients
2013-04-01
ROCHESTER, Minn. -- Researchers at Mayo Clinic Cancer Center have developed new guidelines to treat recently diagnosed multiple myeloma patients who are not participating in clinical trials. The guidelines give physicians practical, easy to follow recommendations for providing initial therapy, stem cell transplant and maintenance therapy. The guidelines are published in the current issue of the journal Mayo Clinic Proceedings and represent a consensus opinion of hematologists at Mayo Clinic Cancer Center sites in Minnesota, Florida and Arizona.
"Multiple myeloma is an ...
Research deciphers HIV attack plan
2013-04-01
LOS ALAMOS, N. M., March 29, 2013—A new study by Los Alamos National Laboratory and University of Pennsylvania scientists defines previously unknown properties of transmitted HIV-1, the virus that causes AIDS. The viruses that successfully pass from a chronically infected person to a new individual are both remarkably resistant to a powerful initial human immune-response mechanism, and they are blanketed in a greater amount of envelope protein that helps them access and enter host cells.
These findings will help inform vaccine design and interpretation of vaccine trials, ...
Newly approved blood thinner may increase susceptibility to some viral infections
2013-04-01
CHAPEL HILL, N.C. – A study led by researchers at the University of North Carolina indicates that a newly approved blood thinner that blocks a key component of the human blood clotting system may increase the risk and severity of certain viral infections, including flu and myocarditis, a viral infection of the heart and a significant cause of sudden death in children and young adults.
For the past 50 years, people with the heartbeat irregularity, atrial fibrillation, and others at increased risk for forming potentially life-threatening blood clots have been given the ...
Congestion in the Earth's mantle
2013-04-01
Jena (Germany) The Earth is dynamic. What we perceive as solid ground beneath our feet, is in reality constantly changing. In the space of a year Africa and America are drifting apart at the back of the Middle Atlantic for some centimeters while the floor of the Pacific Ocean is subducted underneath the South American Continent. "In 100 million years' time Africa will be pulled apart and North Australia will be at the equator," says Prof. Dr. Falko Langenhorst from the Friedrich Schiller University Jena (Germany). Plate tectonics is leading to a permanent renewal of the ...
Researchers discover new clues about how amyotrophic lateral sclerosis develops
2013-04-01
Johns Hopkins scientists say they have evidence from animal studies that a type of central nervous system cell other than motor neurons plays a fundamental role in the development of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), a fatal degenerative disease. The discovery holds promise, they say, for identifying new targets for interrupting the disease's progress.
In a study described online in Nature Neuroscience, the researchers found that, in mice bred with a gene mutation that causes human ALS, dramatic changes occurred in oligodendrocytes — cells that create insulation for ...
New models predict drastically greener Arctic in coming decades
2013-04-01
New research predicts that rising temperatures will lead to a massive "greening," or increase in plant cover, in the Arctic. In a paper published on March 31 in Nature Climate Change, scientists reveal new models projecting that wooded areas in the Arctic could increase by as much as 50 percent over the next few decades. The researchers also show that this dramatic greening will accelerate climate warming at a rate greater than previously expected.
"Such widespread redistribution of Arctic vegetation would have impacts that reverberate through the global ecosystem," said ...