**Author details**

*Advances in Poultry Nutrition Research*

and feeding [32].

**16. Conclusions**

more aspects of nanominerals.

them at an optimum dose for their use in poultry.

**15. Other nanoparticles in poultry nutrition**

FeO NP caused 100% mortality at 200 mg/L and decreased body weights and crown-rump lengths of embryo at 50 and 100 mg/mL and 50–60% degeneration of neurons in brain at 10–100 mg/L dose range [133]. It seems few minerals in their nanoforms are more toxic than their coarser forms. Therefore, safety and toxicity levels of different nanominerals should be widely evaluated before recommending

Many other nanomaterials have been used in poultry nutrition. For instance, turmeric extract enclosed in a nanocapsule improved meat quality traits without affecting performance as a feed additive for regular broiler feed and 0.2% turmeric nanocapsule was the optimum level to obtain the best feed efficiency, whereas 0.4% of the nanocapsule decreased liver cholesterol and subcutaneous fat, but concentration at >0.4% reduced growth in birds [134]. Clay minerals of nano-suspensions added at 1 to 2% of the suspension in drinking water in broiler chickens were found to improve feed conversion ratio, body weight gain and antibody titer against Newcastle disease, infectious bronchitis and bursal disease [135]. There is huge potential of functionalizing many nanoparticles for application in poultry nutrition

Minerals are obligatory for maintaining the higher productivity of poultry and a better bioavailable source at lower cost is the prime priority. In this context, nanominerals have produced encouraging responses in most of the studies. Though inconsistent, nano form of Zn, Se, Cu, Ca, and P mostly produced improved responses in poultry reflected by their performances such as body weight gain, feed efficiency, immune responses, egg production, egg quality traits, bone quality parameters, retention of minerals, and enzyme level. The inconsistent performance may be attributed to the level of minerals present in feeds itself and also the varied doses used depending on the hypothesis of the researchers. Many cases have given similar responses even by reducing the dose to half of the conventional inorganic doses, which is suggestive of better bioavailability. Apart from the biological effects in birds, the nanominerals are found to reduce the environmental excretion of the minerals by virtue of its better bioavailability and also reducing the dose of supplementation as well. Considering all the aspects, this can be suggested that use of nanominerals in poultry ration can be considered as an environmental protective strategy to augment poultry productivity. However, further studies with more replicates should be advocated along with long term exposure to validate and unveil

**74**

Partha Sarathi Swain1 , Sonali Prusty2 , Somu Bala Nageswara Rao3 , Duraisamy Rajendran3 and Amlan Kumar Patra4 \*

1 Office of Block Veterinary Officer, Fisheries and Animal Resources Development Department, Government of Odisha, Barang, Cuttack, Odisha, India

2 Department of Animal Nutrition, College of Veterinary Science and Animal Husbandry, Dau Shri Vasudev Chandrakar Kamdhenu Vishwavidyalaya, Durg, Chhattisgarh, India

3 Animal Nutrition Division, ICAR- National Institute of Animal Nutrition and Physiology, Bangalore, India

4 Department of Animal Nutrition, West Bengal University of Animal and Fishery Sciences, Kolkata, India

\*Address all correspondence to: patra\_amlan@yahoo.com

© 2021 The Author(s). Licensee IntechOpen. This chapter is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
