Feeding Leaves Modulates Lipid Metabolism and Improves the Meat Quality of Goats.

() is a medicinal plant widely grown in tropical South China. Given the abundant pruning waste of its leaves, the use of leaves is valuable. In this study, goats were fed a diet containing 20% leaves. Compared with the basal diet, feeding leaves to goats did not affect growth performance but considerably reduced the feeding cost. Strikingly, feeding leaves resulted in a significant decrease in the blood cholesterol levels (2.11 vs. 1.49 mmol/L, = 0.01) along with a significant increase in the high-density lipoprotein levels (1.42 vs. 1.82 mmol/L, = 0.01). There was also a tendency to lower the content of low-density lipoprotein levels in goats (0.78 vs. 0.45 mmol/L, = 0.09). Furthermore, metabolomics analysis demonstrated that the reduction in cholesterol levels occurred in both the serum (0.387-fold change) and muscle (0.382-fold change) of goats during leaf feeding. The metabolic responses to feeding leaves suggest that the activation of lipolysis metabolism might happen in goats. These observed changes would be conducive to improving animal health and meat quality, ultimately benefiting human health.