LIGNIN AS A PURIFIED DIETARY FIBER SUPPLEMENT FOR PIGLETS

A study with 32 Landrace x Yorkshire piglets weaned at 21 days of age was conducted to assess the effect of lignin on growth performance and blood metabolites mostly those related to lipid metabolism. Four diet ary treatments were as follows: 1. Standard corn-soybean meal diet (co ntrol), 2. Control supplemented with 1.25% lignin, 3. High-cholesterol diet which included dried whole egg powder, dried skim milk and other ingredients to mimic a human high-cholesterol diet, 4. As diet 3 supp lemented with 1.25% lignin. The diets were offered for 4 weeks. Pigs r eceiving the control diet were significantly (p=0.0054) heavier and ha d better (p=0.0038) feed conversion than those fed the high-cholestero l diet. Lignin supplementation affected neither the live body weight o f the piglets nor the feed efficiency. There was no significant differ ence in feed intake among the treatments. The plasma triglyceride leve ls were significantly (p=0.0407) reduced by Lignin supplementation in the control and high cholesterol diets. Plasma cholesterol and high de nsity lipoprotein cholesterol levels were significantly higher in pigl ets fed the high cholesterol diet as compared to those fed the control diet. Neither type of diet, nor lignin supplementation had a signific ant effect on plasma glucose or blood urea nitrogen levels. The result s of the present study indicate that lignin supplementation has a hypo lipemic but not hypocholesterolemic property when fed to the piglets. (C) 1997 Elsevier Science Inc.