Influence of feeding thermally peroxidized soybean oil on growth performance, digestibility, gut integrity, and oxidative stress in nursery pigs.

The objectives of the current experiments were to evaluate the effect of feeding soybean oil (SO) with different levels of peroxidation on lipid, N, and GE digestibility, gut integrity, oxidative stress, and growth performance in nursery pigs. Treatments consisted diets containing 10% fresh SO (22.5 °C) or thermally processed SO (45 °C for 288 h, 90 °C for 72 h, or 180 °C for 6 h), each with an air infusion of 15 L/min, with postprocessing peroxide values of 7.6, 11.5, 19.1, and 13.4 mEq/kg and p-anisidine values of 1.92, 6.29, 149, and 159, for the 22.5 °C, 45 °C, 90 °C and 180 °C processed SO, respectively. In experiment 1, 64 barrows (7.1 ± 0.9 kg initial BW) were randomly allotted into 2 rooms of 32 pens and individually fed their experimental diets for 21 d, with a fresh fecal sample collected on day 20 for determination of GE and lipid digestibility. In experiment 2, 56 barrows (BW 9.16 ± 1.56 kg) were placed into individual metabolism crates for assessment of GE, lipid, and N digestibility and N retention. Urinary lactulose to mannitol ratio was assessed to evaluate in vivo small intestinal integrity, and urine and plasma were collected to analyze for markers of oxidative stress. Pigs were subsequently euthanized to obtain liver weights and analyze the liver for markers of oxidative stress. In experiment 1, pigs fed the SO thermally processed at 90 °C had reduced ADG (P = 0.01) and ADFI (P = 0.04) compared to pigs fed the other SO treatment groups, with no differences noted among pigs fed the 22.5 °C, 45 °C, and 180 °C SO treatments. No effects of feeding thermally processing SO on dietary GE or lipid digestibility (P > 0.10) were noted in either experiment. In experiment 2, there was no dietary effect of feeding peroxidized SO on the DE:ME ratio, N digestibility, or N retained as a percent of N digested, on the urinary ratio of lactulose to mannitol, on serum, urinary, or liver thiobarbituric acid reactive substances, on plasma protein carbonyls, or on urinary or liver 8-OH-2dG (P > 0.10). In experiment 2, pigs fed the SO thermally processed at 90 °C had the greatest isoprostane concentrations in the serum (P ≤ 0.01) and urine (P ≤ 0.05) compared to pigs fed the unprocessed SO. These results indicate that the change in fatty acid composition and/or the presence of lipid peroxidation products in peroxidized SO may reduce ADG and ADFI in nursery pigs, but appears to have no impact on GE, lipid, or N digestibility, or gut permeability. These data suggest that the presence of lipid peroxidation products may affect certain markers of oxidative stress.