Effect of Soaking and Fermentation of Wheat Bran on Weight Gain, Accumulative Food Intake and Food Efficiency Ratio in Rats

This study was conducted to investigate the effect of different processing treatments in terms of soaking and fermentation of wheat bran on weight gain, accumulative food intake and food efficiency ratio in Sprague-Dawley rats. The experimental diets included casein diet (zero-bran), untreated bran diet, soaked bran diet, fermented bran diet, “soaked and fermented†bran diet and Arabic bread diet. Each group of rats (6/group) was fed one of the six prepared diets for 6 weeks. There was no significant difference (p > 0.05) in the body weight gain among all rat groups, although the rats fed soaked diet tended to have the highest weight gain in comparison with other groups. There was no significant difference in FER among all groups, although, there was a difference between groups in the accumulative food intake. Accumulative food intake (AFI) of the rat group fed soaked bran based-diet was the highest (685.6 ± 17.3 gm) among all groups whereas AFI of the rat group fed “soaked and fermented†bran-based diet was the lowest (550.0 ± 19.1 gm). Rat group fed “soaked and fermented†bran-based diet had significantly lower levels (p < 0.05) of AFI than those fed untreated bran diet, soaked bran diet and white bread diet (550.0 ± 19.1, 663.4 ± 16.6, 685.6 ± 17.3 and 629.8 ± 28.4 gm respectively). Accordingly, the AFI of the rat group fed soaked bran diet was significantly higher (p < 0.05) than those fed casein and fermented diet (685.6 ± 17.3, 598.4 ± 9.2 and 605.8 ± 25.6 gm respectively). It is concluded that preparation of wheat bran foods by soaking or/and fermentation improve some physiological characteristics of insoluble fibers, including the body weight changes, accumulative food intake and food efficiency ratio for 6 weeks.