Evaluation of nasal microbial communities of beef calves during pre-weaning outbreak of bovine respiratory disease

The animal's commensal bacterial populations have been associated with disease occurrence. Therefore, an understanding of the animal's resident respiratory pathogens in the upper nasal cavity may help us to understand the impact of these pathogens on incidence of respiratory disease in cattle. The overall goal was to characterize bacterial populations associated with pre-weaning calves during two separate outbreaks of bovine respiratory disease complex. Nasal swabs from the upper nasal cavity were collected at the time of two outbreaks of bovine respiratory disease complex. To evaluate and compare the microbiome, the variable region of the 16S ribosomal gene was amplified and sequenced with Illumina MiSeq.