Nutritional effects of autoxidized fats in animal diets

1. Beef fat oxidized to a peroxide value of 109 μmoles/g (218 m-equiv./kg), with a reduction in iodine value of 3.4 units, was incorporated at a 5% level in the diet of day-old chicks (diet 2) and stored for 8 weeks at room temperature during feeding. Similar diets containing fresh fat (diet 1, peroxide value zero) or oxidized fat in which the peroxide had been largely destroyed by heating (diet 3, peroxide value 2 μmoles/g) were also used. The diets contained adequate but not excessive levels of all vitamins, including stabilized vitamin A, except that for half of the chicks the supplement of stabilized vitamin E was omitted. 2. No further oxidation of the dietary lipid occurred during storage, and the initially high peroxide value in diet 2 decreased rapidly. The natural vitamin E decreased by more than 50% in diet 2, but remained unaffected in diets 1 and 3. 3. The chicks grew normally, with no difference in weight gain or feed conversion between the groups, the only differences attributable to the diets being marginally lower vitamin A levels accumulated in the livers of the birds on diet 2 and ajustdetectablyhigher liver weight in the birds on diet 3. 4. One of the twelve chicks receiving oxidized fat (diet 2) without synthetic vitamin E developed encephalomalacia. There was no other suggestion of performance being inferior as a consequence of the absence of the vitamin E supplement. 5. No difference could be detected in the flavour of the chickens, either freshly roasted or reheated.