Dietary water extract of Ampelopsis grossedentata modulates intestinal morphology and pectoral muscle lipid metabolism in broiler chickens in association with AMPK/PPAR-related pathways.

Abstract

This study evaluated the effects of dietary water extract of Ampelopsis grossedentata (WEA) on growth performance, metabolic status, intestinal morphology, and pectoral muscle lipid remodeling in white-feathered broilers. A total of 480 one-day-old broilers were randomly assigned to six dietary treatments and fed a basal diet supplemented with 0, 12.5, 25, 50, 100, or 200 mg/kg WEA for 42 d. Targeted flavonoid profiling showed that flavones and flavonols were the largest subclasses based on annotated compound number, while dihydromyricetin was the most abundant individual compound. Dietary WEA did not significantly affect average daily gain or average daily feed intake, whereas overall feed conversion ratio differed among treatments, with the 50 mg/kg group showing a lower value than the 200 mg/kg group. Most slaughter traits and conventional meat-quality indices were unchanged. WEA increased serum albumin and reduced low-density lipoprotein cholesterol at 50-200 mg/kg on day 42, and improved ileal villus height and villus height-to-crypt depth ratio at selected doses. Based on the relatively favorable feed conversion ratio, reduced serum low-density lipoprotein cholesterol, improved intestinal morphology, and absence of high-dose-associated oxidative fluctuations, the 50 mg/kg WEA group was selected for multi-omics analysis. Pectoral muscle lipidomics identified 46 differential lipid species, characterized by decreased neutral lipids, including triacylglycerols, monoacylglycerols, and free fatty acids, and increased phosphatidylcholine and phosphatidylethanolamine derivatives. Transcriptomic analysis revealed 1,032 differentially expressed genes in pectoral muscle and 1,227 in ileum, with enrichment in AMPK, cAMP, PPAR signaling, lipolysis regulation, and fat digestion and absorption pathways. qPCR further supported AMPK upregulation and FAS downregulation in pectoral muscle, as well as SCD1 downregulation in ileum. These findings indicate that dietary WEA mainly acts as a metabolic and intestinal function modulator rather than a direct growth promoter in broilers, and 50 mg/kg WEA may be a suitable supplementation level for regulating lipid metabolism and intestinal health.