Genetic parameters for the prediction of abdominal fat traits using blood biochemical indicators in broilers

ABSTRACT

1. Excessive deposition of body fat, especially abdominal fat, is detrimental in chickens and the prevention of excessive fat accumulation is an important problem. The aim of this study was to identify blood biochemical indicators that could be used as criteria to select lean Yellow-feathered chicken lines.

2. Levels of blood biochemical indicators in the fed and fasted states and the abdominal fat traits were measured in 332 Guangxi Yellow chickens. In the fed state, the genetic correlations (r_g) of triglycerides and very low density lipoprotein levels were positive for the abdominal fat traits (0.47 ≤ r_g ≤ 0.67), whereas total cholesterol, high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-C) and low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C) showed higher negative correlations with abdominal fat traits (–0.59 ≤ r_g ≤ −0.33). Heritabilities of these blood biochemical parameters were high, varying from 0.26 to 0.60.

3. In the fasted state, HDL-C:LDL-C level was positively correlated with abdominal fat traits (0.35 ≤ r_g ≤ 0.38), but triglycerides, total cholesterol, HDL-C, LDL-C, total protein, albumin, aspartate transaminase, uric acid and creatinine levels were negatively correlated with abdominal fat traits (–0.79 ≤ r_g ≤ −0.35). The heritabilities of these 10 blood biochemical parameters were high (0.22 ≤ h² ≤ 0.59).

4. In the fed state, optimal multiple regression models were constructed to predict abdominal fat traits by using triglycerides and LDL-C. In the fasted state, triglycerides, total cholesterol, HDL-C, LDL-C, total protein, albumin and uric acid could be used to predict abdominal fat content.

5. It was concluded that these models in both nutritional states could be used to predict abdominal fat content in Guangxi Yellow broiler chickens.

KEYWORDS:

• Abdominal fat
• blood biochemical traits
• genetic correlation
• genetic parameter estimation
• Guangxi Yellow chicken
• heritability
• regression

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to acknowledge the members of Guangdong Wens Nanfang Poultry Breeding Co. Ltd for managing the birds and collecting the data, the members of the Poultry Breeding Group of the College of Animal Science and Technology at the Northeast Agricultural University for doing the experiments and writing the manuscript, and the members of the clinical laboratory of the Fourth Hospital of Harbin Medical University for helping in testing the blood biochemical parameters.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This research was supported by the National 863 Project of China: [Grant Number 2013AA102501], the China Agriculture Research System: [Grant Number CARS-42], the National Natural Science Foundation: [Grant Number 31301960], Heilongjiang Postdoctoral Financial Assistance: [Grant Number LBH-TZ0612] and University Nursing Program for Young Scholars with Creative Talents in Heilongjiang Province: [Grant Number UNPYSCT-2015007].