FEATHER MEAL
Feather meal is an 80% protein by-product of broiler, turkey and poultry processing. Hydrolysed feather meal is produced by controlled hydrolysis of natural feathers from fresh plants approved for export process chickens, the ingredients are fresh, and come from the daily processing chickens.
Description:
Hydrolysis involves cutting the protein chains in polypeptides, peptides and amino acids smaller. Is feather meal protein concentrate rich in a-keratin, like hair or wool. This protein is characterized by its strong secondary and tertiary structure, with a high proportion of disulphide bonds between cysteine residues. Because amino acid concentration in hydrophobic groups (phenylalanine, isoleucine, valine and alanine), its solubility in water is very low.
As a result, and despite the absence of anti-nutritional factors, a-keratin natural state is highly digestible (5 percent), as demonstrated by the presence of hairballs in the digestive tract of animals.
Properties:
By suitable processing, feather meal can be a protein concentrate highly palatable and digestible (up to 82% in ruminants). This requires hydrolysed under high pressure (3.2 atm) and temperature (146 ° C) during the period of time required (about 30 minutes) to produce the breaking of chemical bonds that give structure to the keratin. An excessive processing results in amino acid changes less nutritious compounds (lysin alanine lysine, cystine to lanthionine).
Use in Food industry:
One limitation to the use of hydrolysed feather meal in animal feed is the imbalance of essential amino acids. Has a very high concentration in high-cystine and threonine and arginine, but is deficient in methionine, lysine, tryptophan and histidine. For this reason it should be used in monogastric adults. Storage, materials should be stored at room temperature in a dry place. If the material is stored for more than three months, must be reviewed at monthly intervals storage impairment.
