Preliminary Study of the Optimum Dietary Riboflavin Level in Sea Cucumber, Apostichopus japonicus (Selenka)

Abstract

A 14‐wk feeding trial was carried out to evaluate the optimum dietary riboflavin (vitamin B2) level in juvenile sea cucumber, Apostichopus japonicus. A total of 360 sea cucumbers averaging 1.49 ± 0.07 g (mean ± SD) were randomly distributed into 18 rectangular plastic tanks, and each tank was then randomly assigned to one of three replicates of six diets containing 0.29 (B20), 4.22 (B24), 8.93 (B29), 17.9 (B218), 56.7 (B257), and 577 (B2577) mg riboflavin/kg diet. At the end of 14 wk of feeding trial, average weight gain (WG) of sea cucumbers fed B29, B218, B257, and B2577 diets were significantly (P < 0.05) higher than that of animals fed B20 diet. WG of sea cucumbers fed B218, B257, and B2577 diets were significantly higher than those of animals fed B20 and B24 diets. Specific growth rate of sea cucumbers fed B29, B218, B257, and B2577 diets were significantly higher than those of animals fed B20 and B24 diets. Feed efficiency of sea cucumbers fed B29, B257, and B2577 diets were significantly higher than those of animals fed B20 and B24 diets. Although significant differences were recorded in proximate composition of sea cucumbers fed the experimental diets, no clear trends were observed. The ANOVA test suggested that the optimum dietary riboflavin level in sea cucumber could be 17.9 mg/kg diet but broken‐line analysis of WG indicated a level of 9.73 mg riboflavin/kg diet. Therefore, these results may indicate that the optimum dietary riboflavin level in sea cucumber could be higher than 9.73 mg/kg diet but lower than 17.9 mg/kg diet.

Requirement of vitamin E of growing sea cucumberApostichopus japonicusSelenka

“…The outcome of cultured sea cucumber was 219,907 metric ton in 2017 (China Fishery Statistical Yearbook, ). Many researchers have focused on its nutrition requirement, such as protein and lipid (Liao et al, ; Seo & Lee, ), carbohydrate (Xia et al, ), L‐ascorbyl‐2‐polyphosphate (Okorie et al, ; Ren et al, ) and riboflavin (Okorie, Ko, Go, & Bae, ). Besides, Ko et al () and Wang et al () reported that the vitamin E requirements for fry (body weight 1.48 g) and juvenile (body weight 7.96 g) were 23.1–44 mg/kg diet and 114.7 mg/kg diet respectively.…”

Optimal dietary methionine requirement for juvenile sea cucumber Apostichopus japonicus selenka

“…The output of sea cucumber has been tripled in the last decade, and the annual yield got 171,700 tons in 2019 (China Fishery Statistical Yearbook, 2020). Studies have been reported on the requirements of some nutrient, such as protein (Seo & Lee, 2011), lipid (Liao et al., 2017), carbohydrate (Xia et al., 2015), ascorbic acid (Ren et al., 2016), riboflavin (Okorie et al., 2011) and vitamin E (Wang et al., 2015). Up to now, there were no reports on methionine requirement of sea cucumber.…”

Dietary supplementation of red alga Pyropia spheroplasts on growth, feed utilization and body composition of sea cucumber, Apostichopus japonicus (Selenka)

“…Knowledge of the dietary requirements is important for commercial aquaculture. Studies have examined the nutritional requirements (Choi, Seo & Lee, ; Okorie et al., , ; Seo & Lee, ), feed ingredients (Liu, Dong, Tian, Wang & Gao, ; Seo, Shin & Lee, ,b; Shi, Dong, Wang, Gao & Tian, ; Shi et al., ; Slater, Jeffs & Carton, ; Yuan et al., ), diet formation (Xia et al., 2013), culture technology (Pei, Dong, Wang, Gao & Tian, ; Sui, ), water quality (An, Dong & Dong, ; Xie, Zhao & Yang, ; Yuan, Yang, Wang, Zhou & Gabr, ) of sea cucumber. Plant‐based ingredients, especially macroalgae, such as brown alga Sargassum thunbergii (Mertens ex Roth), are considered as a necessary part of the diet of A. japonicus (Xia et al., ).…”