Carmina Nogareda

Academic

Veterinary Degree. University of Zaragoza, Spain 1978
Doctorate/PhD. University of León, Spain 1988

Research

Our research line started when the group of Plant Biotechnology offered us to work with high carotenoid (HC) maize enriched with carotenoids. We fed chickens and laying hens with feed based on the HC maize with high levels of carotenoids (line M37W-Ph3) compared with white corn as unmodified control (line M37W as wildtype) and commercial maize. We evaluated the nutritional value of feed, animal production, color, quality of meat and eggs from animals fed with these different types of feed.
A multidisciplinary project involved a large number of research groups of AGROTECNIO which aims to evaluate the hypothesis that the use of corn genetically modified and enriched with vitamins and antioxidants, has the ability to substantially improve the quality of meat and food safety.
We also studied the effect of a diet with this maize on a very important disease like coccidiosis (Eimeria tenella) with experimental infection. The results obtained demonstrated the beneficial effects of the HC maize because the birds consuming it significantly reduced the pododermatitis and ulcers of the legs, reduced the excretion of oocysts of coccidia, their content of retinol (Vitamin A) in the liver was almost twice and the breast meat and thighs contains more carotenoids. After a trial with laying hens we concluded that hens fed on HC maize were healthy and produced the egg yolks with an “orange-red” significantly higher tonality than controls and that HC maize can be used successfully to provide color additives and Vitamin A in hens’ diets. More poultry studies on bioavailability of carotenoids from HC maize compared with natural and synthetic color additives will add more information to our research line.