| Description |
In total, 180 healthy male yellow-feather chickens at the age of 1 day from the same batch and with the same genetic background were transferred to the animal experiment base of South China Agricultural University. All the chickens were raised in cages under the same environment. The birds were fed commercial diets from Day 1 to Day 53 and then were randomly divided into 2 groups (no difference was found in the average weight among the groups). Each group (90 birds/group) was further subdivided into 6 cages (15 birds/cage). Two different dietary supplement groups were basal diet (BD) and BD+1.5g/kg lutein (from marigold, 2%). The birds were 53 days old at the beginning of the experiment and 74 days old at the end. The experimental period lasted 21 days. Ten chickens were selected randomly from each group, and plasma samples were collected and slaughtered. The raw LC/MS data and all metabolite molecules detected in the sample were analyzed by LC-Bio (Hangzhou, China). |