Diets completely devoid of single essential amino acids were fed to chicks from Day 14 to Day 24 after hatching to investigate the effect on chick growth and nitrogen and energy balances under ad libitum- and equalized-feeding conditions. The effects were different depending upon the amino acid omitted from the diet and were significantly associated with voluntary food intake. Among the essential amino acids, lysine and histidine had the least effect and methionine plus cystine had the severest effect. With equalized-food intake, body weight loss and the reduction in nitrogen balance were diminished by about 44 and 29%, respectively, and the differences in energy utilization disappeared. The possible factors that may explain the nutritional specificity of amino acids are discussed.
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Kino et al. (1986) studied this question.
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