Abstract: An experiment was conducted to investigate dietary zinc level on growth performance,carcass traits and meat quality in broilers from 4 to 6 weeks of age. A total of 360 1-day-old male Arbor Acres chickens were fed the same diet (containing 86.25 mg/ kg Zn) until 21 days of age. At 22 days of age,288 chickens were randomly assigned to eight dietary treatments with six replicates by body weight and six chickens with each pen,and fed a Zn-unsupplenented corn-soybean meal basal diet( control,containing 27.66 mg/kg Zn) or the basal diet supplemented with 20,40,60,80,100,120 and 140 mg/ kg Zn as Zn sulfate. The trial lasted for 21 days. The results showed that there were no significant differences (P>0.10) in growth performance and carcass traits. However,Zinc supplementation decreased the drip loss of breast and leg muscles and malondialdehyde concentrations of breast muscles,increased L^* value of breast muscles (P<0.10).

Key words: zinc; broiler; growth performance; carcass traits; meat quality