Vitamins B Complex include vitamin thiamin, riboflavin, niacin, pantothenic acid, pyridoxine, biotin, folic acid, and Cyanocobalamin.

• vitamins B Complex include vitamin thiamin, riboflavin, niacin, pantothenic acid, pyridoxine, biotin, folic acid, and Cyanocobalamin.
• The B vitamins are involved in many metabolic functions, including energy metabolism.
• A vitamin premix is typically used to compensate for the fluctuating levels of vitamins found naturally in food and to assure adequate levels of all vitamins.

 

 

Vitamin B2(Riboflavin)

• Owing to its role in the metabolism of proteins and fats, vitamin B2 is an essential micronutrient for all major species of livestock and companion animals.
• It is used as a feed additive in all types of feed.
• Riboflavin functions:
• Riboflavin in coenzyme form (FMN or FAD) is called flavoprotein, and acts as an intermediary in the transfer of electrons in biological oxidation-reduction reactions.
• Riboflavin functions in flavoprotein-enzyme systems to help regulate cellular metabolism, and is specifically involved in metabolism of carbohydrates.
• Riboflavin is also an essential factor in amino acid metabolism as part of amino acid oxidases. These enzymes oxidize amino acids to ammonia and a keto-acid.
• In addition, riboflavin plays a role in fat metabolism

 

 

Riboflavin deficiency:

• Vitamin B2 deficiency can cause retarded growth, poor food utilization, and diarrhea.
• The deficiency causes “curled toe paralysis” in birds between the first and second week of age.
• The affected birds walk upon their hocks with the aid of their wings.
• In adult birds, decreased egg production, increased embryonic mortality and dead in shell chicks, with dwarfing and clubbing down feathers are seen.
• curled toe paralysis

 

 

Vitamin B6 (Pyridoxin)

• What is vitamin B6 and what does it do?
• Vitamin B6 is a vitamin that is naturally present in many foods. The animal body needs vitamin B6 for more than 100 enzyme reactions involved in metabolism.
• Vitamin B6 is also involved in brain development during pregnancy and infancy as well as immune function.
• Vitamin B6 is especially vital, This vitamin is responsible for glucose generation, red blood cell and nervous system function, hormone regulation, immune response, niacin synthesis, and gene activation. Pantothenic acid helps with energy metabolism.

 

 

Pyridoxin and nervous system:

• Vitamin B6 helps the body make several neurotransmitters, chemicals that carry signals from one nerve cell to another.
• It is needed for normal brain development and function, and helps the body make the hormones serotonin and norepinephrine, which influence mood, and melatonin.

 

 

Vitamin B12 (Cyanocobalamin)

• Vitamin B12 is the most chemically complex of all the vitamins.
• Role of Vitamin B12 is essential for:
• the maturation of erythrocytes.
• protects against pernicious anaemia
• cell growth and reproduction
• the formation of myelin and nucleoproteins.
• symptoms include Pernicious Anaemia that is a type of megaloblastic anaemia characterised by decreased number of and irreversible nerve cell death. It also causes anaemia, gizzard erosion and fattiness of heart, liver, kidney in poultry.

 

 

Vitamin B12 sources and microbial interactions in meat, eggs, milk, and milk products.

• Vitamin B12 sources and microbial interactions in meat, eggs, milk, and milk products.
• Cattle and sheep are herbivores and eat plants like grass, which is free of B12.
• Cattle are herbivorous ruminant animals and their stomachs contain various microorganisms including B12-synthesizing bacteria.
• The synthesized B12 is absorbed in the intestine and stored in the liver and muscles of cattle or secreted into milk. Bovine milk and fermented milk (yogurt and cheese) are major dairy products for humans.
• Chickens are omnivores and eat both plants and animals that contain considerable amounts of B12.
• The B12 contents of raw meats are generally higher in cattle than in chicken.

 

 

N.B:

• The lack of a trace mineral, cobalt, can result in a vitamin B12 deficiency in cattle.
• This is because cobalt is a part of the vitamin B12 compound and is essential for rumen bacteria to manufacture this vitamin.

 

 

Vitamin B5 (Pantothenic acid )

• Pantothenic acid is a constituent of two important coenzymes, CoA and ACP.
• Coenzyme A is found in all tissues and is one of the most important coenzymes for tissue metabolism.
• The coenzymes are known to be involved in more than 100 different metabolic pathways involving the metabolism of carbohydrates, proteins and lipids and the synthesis of lipids, neurotransmitters, steroid hormones, porphyrins and hemoglobin.

 

 

Deficiency:

• On the basis of observations of pantothenic acid-deficient animals and studies in human volunteers, deficiency of the vitamin is shown in the following signs and symptoms:
• Reduced growth and feed conversion efficiency.
• Lesions of skin and its appendages.
• Disorder of the nervous system.
• Gastrointestinal disturbances.
• Inhibition of antibody formation and thus,
• decreased resistance to infection.
• Impairment of adrenal function.

 

 

Nicotinic acid

• The major function of niacin is in the coenzyme forms of nicotinamide, NAD and NADP.
• Enzymes containing NAD and NADP are important links in a series of reactions associated with carbohydrate, protein and lipid metabolism.
• They are especially important in the metabolic reactions that furnish energy to the animal.
• The coenzymes act as an intermediate in most of the H+ transfers in metabolism, including more than 200 reactions in the metabolism of carbohydrates, fatty acids and amino acids.
• These reactions are of paramount importance for normal tissue integrity, particularly for the skin, the gastrointestinal tract and the nervous system

 

 

Folic acid

• Folic acid (also referred to as folate, vitamin B9 or folacin) is an essential B-vitamin needed for chickens of all ages.
• Folic acid is the synthetic form of B9, found in supplements and fortified foods, while folate occurs naturally in foods.
• Folic acid is crucial for proper brain function and plays an important role in mental and emotional health.
• It aids in the production of DNA and RNA, the body’s genetic material, and is especially important when cells and tissues are growing rapidly.

 

Folic Acid Deficiency:

• In general, lead to poor growth, anaemia, poor feathering and egg production.
• Chicks:
  Folic acid deficiency in chicks is characterized by poor feathering, anemic appearance (waxy white comb and pale mucous membranes in the mouth), lethargy, reduced feed intake, slow growth, and abnormal skeletal development leading to perosis.
• Adult Chickens:
  Folic acid deficiency in adult chickens often have pale combs and wattles, decreased egg production, poor feathering, and reduced hatch rates for offspring.
  Folic-deficient breeder hens tend to produce chicken embryos that die immediately after pipping the air cell while in the later stages of incubation.
  Chicks that are assisted out of their shell will often develop leg deformities.

 

 

Vitamin K3

• vitamin K has been known to be important in the clotting process of blood, because of its involvement in the synthesis of four plasma clotting proteins. These proteins are factor II (prothrombin) and factors VII, IX, and X.
• poultry, such as broiler chickens and turkeys, are more likely to develop signs of vitamin K deficiency than other species of animals, which can be attributed to their short digestive tract and the fast rate of food passage.

 

 

Vitamin E (acetate)

• Vitamin E is part of the body’s intracellular defense against the adverse effects of reactive oxygen and free radicals that initiate oxidation of unsaturated phospholipids.
• At least one important function of vitamin E is to interrupt production of free radicals at the initial stage.
• Membrane structure and prostaglandin synthesis:
• Alpha-tocopherol may be involved in the formation of structural components of biological membranes, thus exerting a unique influence on architecture of membrane phospholipids.
• it was found that alpha-tocopherol exerted a pronounced stimulatory influence on formation of prostaglandin E from arachidonic acid.

 

 

Biotin

• Supplemental biotin can improve hoof health and hoof hardness. Studies have shown significant reductions of sole ulcers, heel erosion, heel warts, claw lesions, and sand cracks when biotin is supplemented (20 mg/day) for 8-12 months.
• Biotin is also a needed cofactor for body enzymes and many metabolic processes.
• Biotin is a necessary co-factor that enables enzymes to work in many chemical reactions in the body.
• Biotin is needed for the body to process amino acids, to make glucose from the propionate produced in the rumen, and to make fat from the acetate produced in the rumen.
• Of course, as the cow makes more milk, she needs more biotin for these functions. Biotin is also required by some of the rumen bacteria, especially the fiber-digesting bacteria.

 

 

Betaine ( HCL)

• Adding betaine will lead to reduced feed costs, and an improved growth and feed conversion ratio.
• Additional benefits are found in improved slaughter characteristics (more breast meat yield and less abdominal fat), preventing heat stress, and promoting better resistance towards coccidiosis.

 

 

Choline chloride
Functions of choline chloride are:

• building and maintaining cell structures.
• fat metabolism of the liver.
• formation of acetylcholine (essential)
• methyl-group donor (non-essential) via betaine.
• building and maintaining cell structures.
• Choline is a metabolic essential for building and maintaining cell structure.
• Choline is a structural part of lecithin (phosphatidylcholine), certain plasmologens and the sphingomyelins.
• Lecithin is a part of animal cell membranes and lipid transport moieties in cell plasma membranes.
• Phospholipids are present in the cell membrane bilayers, and the primary function of these phospholipids are to regulate cell membrane integrity and porosity.
• Choline is required as a constituent of the phospholipids needed for normal maturation of the cartilage matrix of the bone.

 

 

fat metabolism of the liver.

• Choline is referred to as a “lipotropic” factor due to its function of acting on fat
• metabolism by hastening removal or decreasing deposition of fat in liver.
• Choline plays an essential role in fat metabolism in the liver.
• It prevents abnormal accumulation of fat (fatty livers) by promoting its transport as lipoprotein and lecithin or by increasing the utilization of fatty acids in the liver.
• formation of acetylcholine (essential)
• Choline is essential for the synthesis of acetylcholine by mitochondria at the presynaptic
• terminal of the neural synapse, a substance that makes possible the transmission of nerve impulses.

 

 

methyl-group donor (non-essential) via betaine.

• Choline is a source of labile methyl groups.
• Choline furnishes labile methyl groups for formation of methionine from homocystine (Figure) and of creatine from guanidoacetic acid.
• The pathways of choline and 1-carbon metabolism intersect at the formation of methionine from homocysteine.
• Methionine is regenerated from homocysteine in a reaction catalyzed by betaine: homocysteine methyl transferase, in which betaine, a metabolite of choline, serves as the methyl donor.
• To be a source of methyl groups, choline must be converted to betaine, which has been shown to perform methylation functions. Since choline contains biologically active methyl groups, methionine can partly be spared by choline and homocysteine.