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Review
. 2018 Jul 19:9:60.
doi: 10.1186/s40104-018-0276-7. eCollection 2018.

Advances in low-protein diets for swine

Yuming Wang  1   2 , Junyan Zhou  1   2 , Gang Wang  1   2 , Shuang Cai  1   2 , Xiangfang Zeng  1   2 , Shiyan Qiao  1   2
Affiliations
Review

Advances in low-protein diets for swine

Yuming Wang et al. J Anim Sci Biotechnol. .

Abstract

Recent years have witnessed the great advantages of reducing dietary crude protein (CP) with free amino acids (AA) supplementation for sustainable swine industry, including saving protein ingredients, reducing nitrogen excretion, feed costs and the risk of gut disorders without impairing growth performance compared to traditional diets. However, a tendency toward increased fatness is a matter of concern when pigs are fed low-protein (LP) diets. In response, the use of the net energy system and balanced AA for formulation of LP diets has been proposed as a solution. Moreover, the extent to which dietary CP can be reduced is complicated. Meanwhile, the requirements for the first five limiting AA (lysine, threonine, sulfur-containing AA, tryptophan, and valine) that growing-finishing pigs fed LP diets were higher than pigs fed traditional diets, because the need for nitrogen for endogenous synthesis of non-essential AA to support protein synthesis may be increased when dietary CP is lowered. Overall, to address these concerns and give a better understanding of this nutritional strategy, this paper reviews recent advances in the study of LP diets for swine and provides some insights into future research directions.

Keywords: Amino acid; Crude protein; Growth performance; Gut health; Net energy; Nutrient balance; Pig.

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Conflict of interest statement

All procedures used in experiments of our lab were performed in accordance with the China Agricultural University Animal Care and Use Committee guidelines (ID: SKLAB-B-2010-003).Not applicable.The authors declare that they have no competing interests.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Linear relationship between the reduced percentage of dietary protein ingredients and CP reduction levels for pigs. The data of regression analysis summarized from 10 published research articles evaluating the effect of LP diet on pig performance [, , , , , –134]
Fig. 2
Fig. 2
Linear relationship between the increased percentage of dietary energy ingredients and CP reduction levels for pigs. The data of regression analysis summarized from 10 published research articles evaluating the effect of LP diet on pig performance [, , , , , –134]
Fig. 3
Fig. 3
Linear relationship between the reduced percentage of nitrogen excretion and dietary CP reduction levels for pigs. The data of regression analysis summarized from 7 published research articles evaluating the effect of LP diet on nitrogen excretion [, , , –132, 134]
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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