Influence of Soy Isoflavones and Viral Infection on Hogs Carcass and Microbiota

This study will evaluate the effects of dietary soy isoflavones, inherently present in soybean meal, fed to PRRS-infected pigs and the changes/improvements in animal performance, carcass weight, carcass yield, loin muscle area, loin quality, and belly characteristics.

Benefit of High Dietary Levels of Soybean Meal Fed on Commercial Swine Farms

Recent research indicates benefits of feeding higher levels of soybean meal to health-challenged pigs. The modes of action are not clearly defined and further research is warranted to confirm the response to diets containing high levels of soybean meal fed to pigs in high-health settings versus those in commercial conditions with varying levels of health challenge. This research is designed to utilize a multi-site approach with four locations, a university setting (high-health) and three commercial research facilities (health-challenged), feeding diets with increasing levels of soybean meal and evaluate pig performance.

Determining Productive Energy Content of Soybean Meal

For many years, nutritionists have used digestible energy (DE) and metabolizable energy (ME) to estimate the energy content of feed ingredients used in swine diets. These values suggest that soybean meal has 105% and 98% the energy content of corn, respectively. Recently, the net energy (NE) system has been used to determine the energy content of feed ingredients. Using this methodology, soybean meal is estimated to have approximately 78% the energy content of corn.  This study is designed to estimate the productive energy of soybean meal in swine diets.

Evaluating effects of non-starch polysaccharides in soybean meal on net energy, broiler performance, gut health and microbiota

The movement in the global poultry industry toward an antibiotic/coccidiostat-free grow-out system has created the need for alternatives to reduce gastrointestinal inflammation while improving feed conversion and net energy value of the feed. Identifying specific soybean non-starch polysaccharides (NSP) that support proliferation and colonization of non-beneficial microbes will provide soybean geneticists needed information for future NSP reduction. The genetic elimination of the non-beneficial NSPs will enable increasing the concentrations of valuable economic traits, such as soybean oil and protein, and will increase the feed net energy value of soybean meal.  This study will evaluate soybean meal NSPs and their effects on net energy, broiler performance, and gut health/microbiota.

Re-evaluating the Metabolizable Energy of Soybean Meal in Poultry Diets

Animal nutritionists have valued soybean meal’s metabolizable energy contribution to broiler diets at about 23% lower than the metabolizable energy level that soybean meal contributes to swine diets. Several leading poultry nutritionists believe that the estimate assigned to soybean meal’s energy value is low.  This study will re-evaluate  the energy content of soybean meal in poultry diets.

Soybean Meal in Feed Life Cycle Analysis

Multiple competitors in animal feed have conducted feed-related life cycle analyses  to differentiate their products. This study will compare the environmental footprints of diets formulated with soybean meal to diets formulated with distillers dried grains  and synthetic amino acids for both broilers and swine. It will quantify the environmental impacts of these feed ingredients along the supply chain.