Dietary vitamin E (α-tocopheryl acetate) and organic selenium supplementation: performance and antioxidant status of broilers fed n-3 PUFA-enriched feeds

The experiment was conducted to study the effects of organic selenium (Se-enriched yeast) and vitamin E (α-tocopheryl acetate) supplementation, alone or together, on the performance and antioxidant status of broilers fed diets enriched in n-3 PUFAs using fish oil. Day-old Hubbard-JV strain broiler chicks allocated to one of the following treatments: (1) a commercial basal diet containing 0.15 mg inorganic Se /kg as sodium selenite and 50 mg α-tocopheryl acetate (α-TA)/kg feed acted as the control; (2) VE200: Control diet supplemented with 200 mg α-TA/kg feed; (3) OrgSe0.15: Control with inorganic Se replaced with 0.15 mg organic Se/kg; (4) OrgSe0.30: Control with inorganic Se replaced with 0.30 mg organic Se/kg feed; (5) VE200+OrgSe0.15, (6) VE200+OrgSe0.30. Body weight (BW) and body weight gain (BWG) to 42 d were significantly improved with vitamin E or organic Se at 0.30 mg/kg (but not at 0.15 mg/kg) when supplemented individually, but not in combination, except that VE200+OrgSe0.15 improved 28 and 35-d body weights significantly compared with the control. Feed intake (FI), feed conversion ratio (FCR), mortality, carcass characteristics and relative organ weights, except for the spleen, were unaffected by any of the supplementation treatments. The significant positive effect of VE200 on BWG was observed after 21 d. Relative spleen weight was significantly higher in broilers fed VE200 compared to the other treatments. The antioxidative effects of organic Se and vitamin E, alone or together, were not evident in diets enriched in n-3 PUFAs using 1.5% fish oil.Keywords: Fish oil, n-3 PUFAs, broiler, vitamin E, organic selenium, antioxidan