SynthesisJournal of animal physiology and animal nutrition2026
Meta-Analysis of the Efficacy of Spirulina Intervention in Mitigating the Negative Impact of Heat Stress on Production Physiology and Health Indices of Broilers.
Synthesis in Journal of animal physiology and animal nutrition, 2026. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 2 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
2 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- Meta-Analysis of the Efficacy of Spirulina Intervention in Mitigating the Negative Impact of Heat Stress on Production Physiology and Health Indices of Broilers.Journal of animal physiology and animal nutrition · 2026Pooled it
- Efficacy of yeast and yeast-derived products on growth performance and intestinal morphology of broiler chickens: a meta-analysis.Poultry science · 2026Review
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
3 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
There is an increasing number of published studies on the effect of spirulina (an aquatic plant known for its high nutritional value and potential health benefits) intervention on productivity and health of heat-stressed broilers. However, the effect of spirulina intervention on the performance of broilers exposed to heat stress is poorly understood. A better understanding of the productivity of heat-stressed broilers on spirulina intervention will assist in utilizing these data in decision-support systems in the poultry industry. Therefore, this study aimed to determine the effectiveness of spirulina intervention in enhancing production physiology and health indices of heat-stressed broilers using a meta-analysis approach. A detailed search performed on PubMed, Embase, Google Scholar, ScienceDirect, Scopus, and Web of Science databases on the topic identified 865 publications following the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-analyses (PRISMA) guidelines. Thirteen peer-reviewed studies comprising 4904 broilers exposed to heat stress conditions were used for meta-analysis. Raw mean differences (RMD) between the heat-stressed broilers with and without spirulina intervention were used to calculate the effect sizes. Heat-stressed broilers on spirulina intervention had their average daily feed intake (ADFI), feed conversion ratio (FCR), and average daily gain (ADG) enhanced by 3.39 g/bird/day (p = 0.002), -0.08 (p = 0.010), and 2.83 g/bird/day (p < 0.001), respectively when compared to those in control group. Restricted subgroup analysis showed that moderators (broiler strains, dose level of spirulina, and production phases) affected ADFI, FCR, and ADG in heat-stressed broilers on spirulina intervention. Dressing percentage (RMD = 1.60%; p < 0.001), and weights of breast, thigh, liver, heart, gizzard, spleen, and thymus were higher, but the abdominal fat weight was lower in response to spirulina intervention. Additionally, spirulina intervention increased the levels of hemoglobin (Hb), red blood cell (RBC), white blood (WBC), total protein, albumin, and globulin, and decreased the levels of uric acid, creatinine, total cholesterol, triglycerides, low-density lipoprotein (LDL), alanine aminotransferase (ALT), and aspartate aminotransferase (AST) in broilers exposed to heat stress conditions. The results indicate significant increase in superoxide dismutase (SOD) and glutathione peroxidase (GPx), immunoglobulin G (IgG), immunoglobulin M (IgM), immunoglobulin A (IgA), and reduction in malondialdehyde (MDA) in broilers in comparison with controls. It can be concluded that spirulina intervention has the potential to improve growth performance, organ and carcass parameters, blood characteristics, immune functions, and antioxidative capacity of broilers exposed to heat-stress. These findings can be used by farmers, feed manufacturers, poultry nutritionists, and policymakers in decision-support systems to advance the use of spirulina in the poultry industry.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.