Effects of feeding eubiotics as antibiotic substitutes on growth performance, intestinal histomorphology and microbiology of broilers

Abstract

The inclusion of prebiotics and/or probiotics in broiler diets as a substitute for antibiotics is a topic of interest in poultry nutrition research due to concerns about antibiotic resistance and the need for sustainable poultry production practices. A total of 200 one-day-old chicks were housed in 40 cages, with eight cages repeated per treatment. Birds were fed a basal diet supplemented with one of five feed treatments at the following rates: 0 (control), 0.05 g Neoxyval/kg (antimicrobial growth promoter (AGP)), 0.2 g GalliPro^®/kg (probiotic), 0.6 g TechnoMos^®/kg (prebiotic) and a mixture of 0.2 g GalliPro^®/kg + 0.6 g TechnoMos^®/kg (symbiotic). During 0–42 days, the growth performance of broilers, carcass characteristics and intestinal histomorphology were investigated. The AGP, prebiotic and probiotic-treated birds outperformed the control and symbiotic-treated groups in terms of body weight gain, feed conversion, performance index and feed efficiency. The birds given AGP and probiotics had the longest partial and total small intestine length, while the birds given prebiotics had the smallest. In addition, prebiotic-treated birds had longer ileum villi and higher ileal lactic acid bacteria colonies than control and AGP-treated birds. Clostridium perfringens was eradicated from the ileum by probiotics, but not from the caecum. In conclusion, probiotics and prebiotics can be used as an alternative to antibiotics in broiler diets.

Highlights

• In terms of performance indices, the prebiotic and probiotic groups outperformed the control and symbiotic groups and performed comparably to the AGP group.

• Improvement of ileal histomorphology associated with increase of ileal absorption area and suppression of ileal pathogens, promoting feed efficiency of broilers.

• Prebiotics played a role in eradicating Clostridium perfringens as one of the pathogenic bacteria of the intestine.

Keywords:

• Antibiotic replacements
• broiler performance index
• probiotic
• prebiotic
• symbiotic

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Data availability statement

The data presented in this study are available on request from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Researchers Supporting Project (RSPD2023R1081), at King Saud University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.