Correlation between Skeletal Muscle Calpain Activity and Growth Rate of Chicken

The present study was conducted to know the correlation between both the calpain and calpastatin activities in the skeletal muscle and fractional growth rate (FGR) in normal growth condition using male Satsuma native fowl. FGR was expressed as the ratio of daily gain calculated by the daily gain during 2-3 weeks of age to body weight at 2 weeks of age. The 14 experimental birds with same initial body weight at 2 weeks of age (110g/bird) were selected from 175 birds.The mean of body weight at 3 weeks of age (g) and FGR (%/day) were 207.5±11.9 and 12.66±1.54, respectively. Calpain activities in units/g muscle and units/mg extractable muscle protein were 1.023±0.093 and 0.024±0.004, respectively. The calpastatin activities in units/g muscle and units/mg extractable muscle protein were 0.287±0.027 and 0.013±0.003, respectively. The correlation coefficient between calpain activity in units/g muscle and FGR was -0.66. But, there was no significant correlation between either activities of calpain (units/mg extractable muscle protein) and calpastatin (units/g muscle and units/mg extractable muscle protein) and FGR.