Effect of protease supplementation on apparent ileal crude protein and amino acid digestibility of over-processed soybean meals in broilers.

Background: Nutritional value of proteins in feed ingredients can be negatively affected by hydrothermal processing, which causes large variation in the bioavailability of amino acids (AA) and negatively affects animal productive performance. Supplementation of exogenous proteases could increase the rate of digestion of damaged proteins, thereby increasing overall AA digestibility and bioavailability. The aim was to determine the effect of exogenous protease supplementation on the apparent ileal digestibility (AID) of crude protein (CP) and AA of soybean meals (SBM) with different degrees of hydrothermal processing in broilers.