Effects of dietary Lactobacillus delbrueckii on growth performance, body composition, digestive and absorptive capacity, and gene expression of common carp (Cyprinus carpio Huanghe var)

Abstract

The present study aimed to investigate the effects of dietary supplementation of Lactobacillus delbrueckii (L. delbrueckii) on growth performance, body composition, intestinal enzyme activities and gene expression of Cyprinus carpio Huanghe var. Fish (mean 1.05 ± 0.03 g in triplicate) were conducted for 8 weeks with five treatments in triplicate. The fish in the control were fed a basal diet, and those in D2, D3, D4 and D5 were fed basal diet containing L. delbrueckii at 1 × 10 CFU/g, 1 × 10 CFU/g, 1 × 10 CFU/g and 1 × 10 CFU/g. The growth performance and the hepatic IGF-I expression of fish increased significantly as L. delbrueckii level increased from 0 to 1 × 10 CFU/g, but decreased significantly with further increasing L. delbrueckii levels. The whole body protein, lipid contents, intestinal digestive and absorptive enzyme activities were significantly affected by dietary L. delbrueckii levels with the highest values observed in fish fed diet containing 1 × 10 6  CFU/g L. delbrueckii. The carbohydrate content showed the opposite trend. The results suggest that supplementation of L. delbrueckii as probiotic in the diet at approximately 1 × 10 CFU/g can improve growth performance, intestinal enzyme activities and the growth-related gene expression in Cyprinus carpio Huanghe var.