Chemical composition and prediction of amino acids in fish meals¹

Ten samples of fish meal were collected from various sources across the country and were analyzed for the contents of moisture (Mo), and chemical compositions viz., crude protein (CP), ether extract (EE), crude fibre (CF), total ash (TA), nitrogen free extract (NFE), lysine (L), methionine (M), and tryptophan (T). These results were utilized in developing different regression equations to measure the lysine, methionine and tryptophan contents in fish meal. The prediction equations for these three acids with highest accuracy (R² = 0.94, 0.91 and 0.86 for lysine, methionine and tryptophan, respectively) were:

L (%) = -54.91 + 0.54 x Mo (%) + 0.54 x CP (%) + 1.22x EE (%) + 1.54 x CF (%) 0.58 x TA (%).

M(%) = -17.89 + 0.24 x Mo (%) 0.19 x CP (%) + 0.29 x EE (%)+ 0.57 x CF (%) + 0.17 x TA (%)

T(%) = -5.92 + 0.047 x Mo(%) + 0.064 x CP(%) + 0.199 x EE (%) + 0.14 x CF (%) + 0.062 x TA(%).