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Abstract
The amino acid (AA) and gross energy (GE) content of high protein soybean feed ingredients can vary based on cultivar genetics, environmental growing conditions and
processing procedures used in making soybean meals and soy protein isolates and concentrates.
Using high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) and bomb calorimetry to determine
individual AA and GE content respectively, is costly and takes days to complete. In the current
research near-infrared reflectance spectroscopy (NIRS) was used to build calibration curves to
determine the GE and individual total AA content of high protein soybean products in real-time.
When these curves were validated with about 100 new samples, the NIRS predicted values for
GE and each AA all deviated less than 5% from determined values except for cysteine and
tryptophan. The results indicate that NIRS could be used to quickly ascertain GE and AA
content of high protein soy products to assist in animal diet formulation.