PRJNA430313
chicken gut metagenome Metagenome
Chickens of good and poor feed efficiency differ in their feed intake and gut microbiota composition. However, the cause and effect relationship between FE-associated microbiota and chicken's FL is not clear. In the present study, we investigated the effect of FL on host FE, nutrient retention at 4 weeks of age, and the fecal microbiota at 16 and 29 days post-hatch in broiler chickens divergent in residual feed intake (RFI; a metric for FE). The RFI was determined for the experimental period between 9 and 30 days. At day 30 posthatch, chickens with extreme RFI values (low RFI = good feed efficiency; high RFI = poor feed efficiency) were selected, and only the microbiota composition in excreta at 16 and 29 dph was assessed using paired-end sequencing of the V3-5 region of the 16S rRNA gene using the Illumina MiSeq platform.