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K R Robbins

Publications and source records attributed to K R Robbins.

24 records · Page 2Linked to original sources

Studies on the utilization of lysinoalanine and lanthionine.

Studies were conducted to determine the nutritional value of lysinoalanine for rats and chicks and the nutritional value of lanthionine for chicks. For each experiment, purified crystalline amino acid diets and crystalline lysinoalanine and lanthionine were employed. Results indicated that the lysine moiety of lysinoalanine is completely unavailable to the rat and only partially available to the chick. Of 10 rats fed lysinoalanine, seven developed nephrocytomegaly. The lanthionine studies indicated that the cysteine moiety of lanthionine is 32% available when fed as the racemic mixture and 52% available when fed as the L-DL-isomeric mixture. Thus, it appears that lysinoalanine formation in alkali-treated proteins results in a corresponding decrease in nutritionally available lysine. However, the lanthionine formed under similar conditions results in loss of only one-half of the corresponding level of nutritionally available cysteine.

Alanine↗

Effect of high-level copper feeding on the sulfur amino acid need of chicks fed corn-soybean meal and purified crystalline amino acid diets.

Supplementation of a corn-soybean meal diet with .05% methionine maximized gain and feed efficiency of three-week-old chicks fed copper at either 0 or 250 mg/kg. With copper present at 500 mg/kg, the supplemental methionine requirement was in excess of .10%. Liver copper stores of chicks fed copper at 250 mg/kg declined linearly as supplemental methionine level increased, but methionine level had no effect on liver copper when chicks were fed 500 mg/kg copper. Liver copper accumulation did not occur in chicks fed 250 mg/kg copper when supplemental sulfur was provided as a combination of .05% methionine and 1800 mg/kg sulfide. Irrespective of methionine level, sulfide addition reduced liver copper by one-half in birds fed 500 mg/kg copper. Chicks fed the purified diet were appreciably more susceptible to copper toxicity than those fed the corn-soybean meal diet. Chicks fed the purified diet without supplemental copper required .52% sulfur amino acids (SAA). Chicks fed copper at 250 and 500 mg/kg required .65 and .70 SAA, respectively, although gain and feed efficiency were still depressed when compared with the performance of the control birds. Higher levels of methionine failed to restore growth rates to those achieved with birds fed no supplemental copper. Supplementing the copper-containing diets with up to 1.6% cystine improved performance some but failed to completely overcome the growth depressing effect of copper at 500 mg/kg. Results of additional studies indicated that the purified diet containing .70% SAA and 500 mg/kg copper was nutritionally adequate and that the marked toxicity of copper when fed in the purified diet was due to the chemical nature of the diet rather than to any specific copper-induced nutritional deficiencies.

Amino Acids↗

Estimation of nutrient requirements from growth data.

Two least squares methods of estimating nutrient requirements from growth data were compared. One method involved fitting a broken line by the method of least squares. The requirement was taken as the abscissa of the breakpoint in the curve. The other method involved fitting an appropriate exponential function to the growth data and estimating the requirement as the abscissa of the point on the fitted curve whose ordinate was 95% of the upper asymptote. For the nine sets of data studied, the broken line provided adequate fits for only six. The nonlinear models provided adequate fits for all the data studied. When both the broken line and the chosen nonlinear model provided adequate fits, the estimated requirements were nearly the same. However, the consistently good fits obtained with the nonlinear models suggest that this approach may generally be more useful.

Amino Acids↗