Effect of dietary oregano oil and α‐tocopheryl acetate supplementation on iron‐induced lipid oxidation of turkey breast, thigh, liver and heart tissues

Abstract

Twenty-five 12-week-old turkeys randomly divided into five groups were given a basal diet, or a basal diet supplemented with 200 mg alpha-tocopheryl acetate/kg, or 100 mg oregano oil/kg or 200 mg oregano oil/kg, or 100 mg oregano oil plus 100 mg alpha-tocopheryl acetate/kg diet, for 4 weeks prior to slaughter. Breast, thigh, liver and heart tissues were subjected to iron-induced lipid oxidation, the extent of which was determined by third-order derivative spectrophotometry. Results showed that dietary oregano oil at the inclusion level of 200 mg oregano oil/kg diet was more effective in delaying lipid oxidation compared with the inclusion level of 100 mg/kg, but equivalent to the inclusion of 200 mg alpha-tocopheryl acetate/kg diet, which in turn was inferior to the combined inclusion of 100 mg oregano oil plus 100 mg alpha-tocopheryl acetate/kg, which was superior to all dietary treatments. Thigh tissue was more susceptible to oxidation than breast tissue, although it contained alpha-tocopherol at higher concentrations. Also, lipid oxidation in heart was relatively high, although it contained the highest alpha-tocopherol levels. This indicates that tissue alpha-tocopherol is one important factor influencing the level of lipid oxidation, but the distribution of lipids, iron and oregano oil in tissues must also be taken into consideration. Tissue alpha-tocopherol levels responded to dietary intake of 30-200 mg alpha-tocopheryl acetate/kg in the order heart > liver > thigh > breast. Breast, thigh and heart tissues from the oregano groups presented significantly (p < 0.05) higher levels of alpha-tocopherol compared with the control, the increase being positively correlated with the supplementation level. The increased levels of alpha-tocopherol in these tissues indicated that the dietary oregano oil exerted a protective action on alpha-tocopherol.

Effect of supplementing feed with oregano and/or α-tocopheryl acetate on growth of broiler chickens and oxidative stability of meat

“…An analogous lipid oxidative profile was observed when chicken meat was refrigerated stored at 4 o C for 9 days. These results are in agreement with recent studies showing that diet supplementation with oregano essential oil has the potential to increase the oxidative stability of chicken (Botsoglou et al, 2002a(Botsoglou et al, ,b, 2003a and turkey (Botsoglou et al, 2003b,c;Papageorgiou et al, 2003) tissues.…”

“…Alcicek et al (2003) also reported that dietary supplementation of an essential oil combination from 6 herbs including oregano improved chicken performance. However, other pertinent studies showed that supplementation of poultry diets with oregano essential oil at levels of 50 and 100 mg/kg for broilers (Botsoglou et al, 2002a), and at levels of 100 and 200 mg/kg for turkeys (Papageorgiou et al, 2003), had no beneficial effect on growth performance.…”

The effect of vitamin E and plant extract mixture composed of carvacrol, cinnamaldehyde and capsaicin on oxidative stress induced by high PUFA load in young pigs

“…In relevance to animal nutrition, most in vivo studies have been made on the antioxidant activity of oregano active components, showing improvement of the antioxidative stability of animal tissues during storage Papageorgiou et al, 2003;Janz et al, 2007). In our study, a significantly higher concentration of MDA, a marker commonly used to determine lipid peroxidation in biological samples, was found in the plasma and urine of pigs fed with the linseed oil.…”

The effect of feeding rosemary, oregano, saffron and &#945-tocopheryl acetate on hen performance and oxidative stability of eggs

“…Several studies have been conducted on the effect of dietary essential oils or combinations on the performance of poultry but with varying and often conflicting results. While some reports suggested that dietary herbal essential oils improved growth performance (Alcicek et al, 2003;Basmacioglou et al, 2004), others showed no such effect (Botsoglou et al, 2002a;Lee et al, 2003;Papageorgiou et al, 2003).…”

“…Supplementation of poultry diets with essential oils has been found to be a simple and convenient strategy to introduce natural antioxidants into meat (Botsoglou et al, 2002a). In vivo studies have shown that oleoresins of rosemary and sage (Lopez-Bote et al, 1998), tea extracts (Tang et al, 2000; and essential oil of oregano (Botsoglou et al, 2002b;2003a,b,c;Papageorgiou et al, 2003) could increase the oxidative stability of chicken and turkey tissues when incorporated into their diets.…”