Effectiveness of dietary xylo-oligosaccharides for broilers fed a conventional corn-soybean meal diet

An experiment was conducted to investigate the effect of dietary supplementation of xylo-oligosaccharides (XOS) on growth performance, meat quality, immune functions, duodenal morphology and intestinal microbial populations of broilers fed a conventional corn-soybean meal basal diet. A total of 450 1-day-old commercial Arbor Acres male broiler chicks were randomly allocated by bodyweight to 1 of 5 treatments with 6 replicate cages (15 broilers per cage) for each of 5 treatments in a completely randomized design. Chicks were fed the basal corn-soybean meal diets supplemented with 0, 25, 50, 75, or 100 mg of XOS kg−1 of diet, respectively, for an experimental duration of 42 days. The results showed that supplementation of XOS affected feed conversion rate (feed/gain, F/G) during days 22–42 and 1–42 (P<0.03), drip loss in thigh muscle (P=0.02), and duodenal crypt depth (P=0.005) on day 42, but had no effect (P>0.05) on all other measured indices. The chicks fed the diet supplemented with 100 mg of XOS kg−1 had the lowest (P<0.05) F/G and drip loss in thigh muscle. The drip loss in thigh muscle decreased linearly (P=0.003) as the supplemented XOS increased. Duodenal crypt depth decreased (P<0.05) at the supplemental level of 75 mg of XOS kg−1. The results indicate that dietary supplementations of 75 and 100 mg of XOS kg−1 are beneficial to broilers fed a conventional corn-soybean meal diet.