Effect of growing regions on morphological characteristics, protein subfractions, rumen degradation and molecular structures of various whole-plant silage corn cultivars

Xinyue Zhang; Nazir Ahmad Khan; Enyue Yao; Fanlin Kong; Ming Chen; Rifat Ullah Khan; Xin Liu; Yonggen Zhang; Hangshu Xin

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0282547

Effect of growing regions on morphological characteristics, protein subfractions, rumen degradation and molecular structures of various whole-plant silage corn cultivars

PLoS One. 2024 Jan 11;19(1):e0282547. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0282547. eCollection 2024.

Authors

Xinyue Zhang^{1

2}, Nazir Ahmad Khan³, Enyue Yao¹, Fanlin Kong², Ming Chen⁴, Rifat Ullah Khan³, Xin Liu¹, Yonggen Zhang¹, Hangshu Xin¹

Affiliations

¹ College of Animal Science and Technology, Northeast Agricultural University, Harbin, China.
² State Key Laboratory of Animal Nutrition, Beijing Engineering Technology Research Center of Raw Milk Quality and Safety Control, College of Animal Science and Technology, China Agricultural University, Beijing, China.
³ Department of Animal Nutrition, The University of Agriculture Peshawar, Peshawar, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan.
⁴ College of Agronomy and Biotechnology, National Maize Improvement Center of China, China Agricultural University, Beijing, China.

Abstract

Little information exists on the variation in morphological characteristics, nutritional value, ruminal degradability, and molecular structural makeup of diverse whole-plant silage corn (WPSC) cultivars among different growing regions. This study investigated the between-regions (Beijing, Urumchi, Cangzhou, Liaoyuan, Tianjin) discrepancies in five widely used WPSC cultivars in China (FKBN, YQ889, YQ23, DK301 and ZD958), in terms of 1) morphological characteristics; 2) crude protein (CP) chemical profile; 3) Cornell Net Carbohydrate and Protein System (CNCPS) CP subfractions; 4) in situ CP degradation kinetics; and 5) CP molecular structures. Our results revealed significant growing region and WPSC cultivar interaction for all estimated morphological characteristics (P < 0.001), CP chemical profile (P < 0.001), CNCPS subfractions (P < 0.001) and CP molecular structural features (P < 0.05). Except ear weight (P = 0.18), all measured morphological characteristics varied among different growing regions (P < 0.001). Besides, WPSC cultivars planted in different areas had remarkably different CP chemical profiles and CNCPS subfractions (P < 0.001). All spectral parameters of protein primary structure of WPSC differed (P < 0.05) due to the growing regions, except amide II area (P = 0.28). Finally, the area ratio of amide I to II was negatively correlated with the contents of soluble CP (δ = -0.66; P = 0.002), CP (δ = -0.61; P = 0.006), non-protein nitrogen (δ = -0.56; P = 0.004) and acid detergent insoluble CP (δ = -0.43; P = 0.008), in conjunction with a positive correlation with moderately degradable CP (PB1; δ = 0.58; P = 0.01). In conclusion, the cultivar of DK301 exhibited high and stable CP content. The WPSC planted in Beijing showed high CP, SCP and NPN. The low rumen degradable protein of WPSC was observed in Urumchi. Meanwhile, above changes in protein profiles and digestibility were strongly connected with the ratio of amide I and amide II.

Copyright: © 2024 Zhang et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

MeSH terms

Amides
Animal Feed / analysis
Animals
Carbohydrates
Dietary Proteins / metabolism
Digestion
Molecular Structure
Rumen / metabolism
Silage*
Zea mays* / metabolism

Substances

Carbohydrates
Amides
Dietary Proteins

Grants and funding

This research was funded by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 31702135) and China Agriculture Research System of MOF and MARA. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.