Antioxidants, Vol. 14, Pages 1459: Effects of Short-Term Feeding of Resveratrol on Growth Performance, Meat Quality, Antioxidant Capacity, Serum Biochemical Parameters and Intestinal Health in Yellow-Feathered Broilers Under Dexamethasone-Induced Oxidative Stress

Antioxidants doi: 10.3390/antiox14121459

Authors:
Hui Ye
Yangyu Wang
Huilan Zhu
Chao Huang
Weiwei Wang
Yifan Jia
Zhaoheng Hu
Huiyun Zhou
Shujie Liang
Chong Ling
Changming Zhang
Zemin Dong
Jianjun Zuo

Oxidative stress is believed to deteriorate production performance and cause substantial economic losses in commercial poultry farming. Resveratrol (RES) is a polyphenolic antioxidant that can improve intestinal barrier function and regulate gut microbiota composition. This study aimed to evaluate whether short-term (14 days) dietary resveratrol (1000–3000 mg/kg) mitigates dexamethasone (DEX)-induced oxidative stress and performance loss in yellow-feathered broilers. Two hundred and forty 52-day-old birds were assigned to five treatments (n = 8 pens × 6). Control (CON) and DEX groups received the basal diet; DR1, DR2 and DR3 were provided with the basal diet plus 1000, 2000 or 3000 mg/kg RES. During days 1–5, the DEX and RES (DR1, DR2 and DR3) groups were intraperitoneally injected with 5 mg/kg BW DEX; CON birds received saline. DEX significantly reduced average daily gain (ADG) and raised feed conversion ratio (FCR) (p < 0.05) without altering feed intake. RES at 1000–2000 mg/kg improved ADG, reduced FCR and lowered serum corticosterone and blood urea nitrogen while increasing albumin (p < 0.05). DEX elevated malondialdehyde (MDA) in liver and thigh muscle, suppressed liver catalase (CAT) activity, and suppressed thigh muscle superoxide dismutase (SOD), glutathione peroxidase (GSH-Px) and CAT activities. In serum, only SOD activity decreased. RES partially alleviated the abnormal changes in these antioxidant indices. Intestinally, DEX increased MDA, shortened villi and reduced the villus-to-crypt ratio, whereas RES partially reinstated ileal morphology, decreased MDA dose-dependently and linearly enhanced duodenal SOD activity (p < 0.05). DEX downregulated Occludin mRNA; RES upregulated Occludin and elevated ileal GPX2, SOD, CAT and PPAR-γ transcripts with a quadratic response to RES dose, while lowering duodenal CAT mRNA. Overall, short-term RES supplementation—particularly at 1000–2000 mg/kg—improves growth performance, meat quality and intestinal health of yellow-feathered broilers under DEX-induced oxidative stress by enhancing systemic and intestinal antioxidant capacity and reinforcing epithelial barrier integrity.

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