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Effects of Dietary Plant Protein Replacement by Insect and Poultry By-Product Meals on Liver Health and Serum Metabolites of Sea Bream (Sparus aurata) and Sea Bass (Dicentrarchus labrax)
Donadelli, V.; Di Marco, P.; Mandich, A.; Finoia, M.G.; Cardinaletti, G.; Petochi, T.; Longobardi, A.; Tibaldi, E.; Marino, G. Effects of Dietary Plant Protein Replacement with Insect and Poultry By-Product Meals on the Liver Health and Serum Metabolites of Sea Bream (Sparus aurata) and Sea Bass (Dicentrarchus labrax). Animals2024, 14, 241.
Donadelli, V.; Di Marco, P.; Mandich, A.; Finoia, M.G.; Cardinaletti, G.; Petochi, T.; Longobardi, A.; Tibaldi, E.; Marino, G. Effects of Dietary Plant Protein Replacement with Insect and Poultry By-Product Meals on the Liver Health and Serum Metabolites of Sea Bream (Sparus aurata) and Sea Bass (Dicentrarchus labrax). Animals 2024, 14, 241.
Donadelli, V.; Di Marco, P.; Mandich, A.; Finoia, M.G.; Cardinaletti, G.; Petochi, T.; Longobardi, A.; Tibaldi, E.; Marino, G. Effects of Dietary Plant Protein Replacement with Insect and Poultry By-Product Meals on the Liver Health and Serum Metabolites of Sea Bream (Sparus aurata) and Sea Bass (Dicentrarchus labrax). Animals2024, 14, 241.
Donadelli, V.; Di Marco, P.; Mandich, A.; Finoia, M.G.; Cardinaletti, G.; Petochi, T.; Longobardi, A.; Tibaldi, E.; Marino, G. Effects of Dietary Plant Protein Replacement with Insect and Poultry By-Product Meals on the Liver Health and Serum Metabolites of Sea Bream (Sparus aurata) and Sea Bass (Dicentrarchus labrax). Animals 2024, 14, 241.
Abstract
The liver health of Gilthead sea bream and European sea bass fed fishmeal-free diets including various proportions of plant proteins, insect and poultry by-product meals, was investigated through biochemical and histological analyses using a new Liver Index (LI) formula. Four isoproteic (45% DM) and isolipidic (20% DM) diets were compared: a control, plant-based diet (CV) and other three test ones where 40% of a plant protein-rich ingredient mixture was replaced by Hermetia illucens (H40) or poultry by-product (P40) meals alone or in combination (H10P30). The trials lasted 12 and 18 weeks for sea bream and sea bass, respectively. The results so far ob-tained highlighted species-specific differences in the physiological response to dietary changes. In sea bream, the biochemical and histological responses suggest favorable physiological status and liver health, with higher serum cholesterol (CHO) and triglyceride (TAG) levels and moderate hepatocyte lipid accumulation with the H10P30 diet compared to CV (p<0.05). In sea bass, all diets resulted in elevated serum TAG levels and liver lipid accumulation particularly in fish fed the P40 one (p<0.05) which resulted in the highest LI, coupled with higher frequency of severe lipid accumulation, hypertrophy, cord loss, peripheral nuclei displacement and pyknosis.
In conclusion sea bream well adapted to the test diets, while sea bass exhibited altered hepatic lipid metabolism leading to incipient liver steatosis, likely due to the high lipid content of the diets including the insect and poultry meals. The LI developed in this study proved to be a reliable tool for assessing the effects of dietary changes on liver health of sea bream and sea bass, consistent with biochemical and histological findings.
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