Predictability of fat-free mass and fat content in intact hen’s eggs using electrical conductivity

• Main Authors: Róbert Romvári, Gabriella Andrássy-Baka, Gábor Milisits
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Taylor & Francis Group 2010-01-01
• Series: Italian Journal of Animal Science
• Subjects: Egg, Fat, TOBEC, Electrical conductivity
• Online Access: http://www.aspajournal.it/index.php/ijas/article/view/927

The effect of egg size and composition on the viability of the offspring has been tested in several former experiments, but the clarification of these correlations was mainly hindered by the lack of a reliable technique/equipment, capable of determining the egg composition in vivo. In the course of the present work electrical conductivity (the so-called TOBEC method) was applied for determining the fat-free mass and the fat content of intact eggs in vivo. Using hen’s eggs in this trial it was established that for predicting the fat-free mass in hen’s eggs, the weight of eggs seems to be a very good predictor (R2=0.99) and therefore the use of the TOBEC method is not necessary in this case. In prediction of the weight and ratio of fat, the common use of the E-value (total conductivity index) and weight of eggs in the regression models resulted in a medium accuracy of prediction (R2=0.48-0.49).