AbstractFour soya bean (Glycine maxMerr) inbreds, two of which (Williams 82 and Amsoy 71) capable of synthesising the Kunitz trypsin inhibitor (high trypsin inhibitory activity (TIA)) and two (L81–4590 and L83–4387), nearly isogenic to the former but lacking this particular function (low TIA) were used. In‐vitro trials were performed to evaluate the residual TIA of flours incubated with runem fluid and the possible effect of proteinase inhibitors on rumen microbial fermentation, estimated by gas production. Only a slow fall in TIA was observed after short incubation times (5–10 at 2 h and 10–18 at 6 h), but after this period the rate of decline of TIA accelerated to give residual TIA of about 50 after 12 h and undetectable values after 48 h. Significant differences between genetic backgrounds were observed only at 2 h, when the Williams 82 background had a faster initial loss of TIA (89.1 versus 97.5 of the original activity,P<0.01). Different patterns of TIA degradation were observed according to the presence/absence of the Kunitz inhibitor: inbreds lacking the Kunitz inhibitor initially had a higher residual TIA (95.9 versus 90.7,P<0.01) while at 12 and 24 h the residual TIA was considerably lower with respect to the other inbreds (45.4 versus 60.8 and 10.7 versus 20.4, respectively,P<0.01). Gas production after 2 and 6 h of incubation was similar across treatments, whereas slightly but consistently more (P<0.05) gas was produced at longer incubation times for inbreds lacking the Kunitz inhibitor. The results indicated that the proteinase inhibitors contained in raw soya bean are degraded at a much slower rate than previous nylon bag studies have suggested and that the presence of the Kunitz inhibitor leads to a higher residual TIA after rumen degradation and slightly lower microbial gas p
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