Dietary total aromatic amino acid requirement and tyrosine replacement value for phenylalanine for fingerling<i>Oreochromis</i><i>niloticus</i>(Linnaeus)

Abstract

This study was conducted to determine the dietary total aromatic amino acid requirement and tyrosine replacement value for phenylalanine for fingerling Oreochromis niloticus by conducting two 8-week experiments. In experiment I, phenylalanine requirement was determined by feeding test diets (350 g kg–1 CP; 16.72 kJ g–1 GE) with graded levels of phenylalanine (4, 6.5, 9, 11.5, 14 and 16.5 g kg–1 dry diet) at a constant level (10 g kg–1) of dietary tyrosine to triplicate groups of fish (1.65 ± 0.09 g). Quadratic analyses of absolute weight gain (AWG), protein deposition (PD%) and phenylalanine retention efficiency (PRE%) indicated the requirement at 12.1 g kg–1 dry diet. In experiment II, six diets with different levels of L-tyrosine (2.0, 4.0, 6.0, 8.0, 10.0 and 12.0 g kg–1 dry diet) with 12.1 g kg–1 phenylalanine as determined in experiment I fixed in all the test diets were fed to fish (1.67 ± 0.17 g) to determine the tyrosine requirement under same conditions. Quadratic regression analysis of AWG, PD and PRE demonstrated the tyrosine requirement at 8.5 g kg–1 dry diet, corresponding to 24.2 g kg–1 of dietary protein. Based on the above data, the total aromatic amino acid requirement was found to be 20.6 g kg–1 of dry diet, corresponding to 58.8 g kg–1 of dietary protein, and tyrosine replacement value for phenylalanine was found to be 37% on a molar basis.