Dietary sodium citrate improved oxidative stability in red hybrid tilapia (Oreochromis sp.) but reduced growth, health status, intestinal short chain fatty acids and induced liver damage

Among organic acids, citric acid and their salts are currently the most studied as a supplement in aquafeeds to potentially improve growth and nutrient utilization in fish. The results have been generally beneficial but no studies have been performed on tilapia. A 50 day experiment was conducted on the effects of dietary sodium citrate at 0, 1, 2 and 4% on the growth, feeding efficiency, body indices, muscle proximate composition, muscle lipid peroxidation, some plasma and blood parameters, intestinal short chain fatty acids (SCFA), and liver histopathology of red hybrid tilapia (Oreochromis sp.). Triplicate groups of 60 tilapia fingerlings (initial weight of 1.86 ± 0.01) were in each treatment. Results showed that, while not significant, increasing dietary sodium citrate reduced tilapia growth (p > 0.05). However, muscle crude protein (r2 = 0.931), lipid (r2 = 0.962), and ash (r2 = 0.834) significantly decreased at increasing dietary sodium citrate levels (p Statement of relevance Sodium citrate reduced growth but may increase shelf-life.