Characterization of Chicken Gut Microbiota in Different Pakistani Breeds with Special Reference to Disease Resistance

Poultry meat is the cheapest available protein source and has become a major substitute for mutton and beef. In Pakistan, poultry is the most systematized agro based sector with the growth rate of 10-12% per year. The poultry sector is generating employment for more than 1.5 million Pakistanis one way or the other by investing PKR 1168 billion. Chickens harbor diverse and complex microbial groups in their gastrointestinal tract (GIT), which can influence various aspects of production, health, development and weight gain. Through direct and indirect competition, chicken gut microbiota can impact colonization and load of pathogenic microorganisms and also influence the chicken intrinsic resistance to pathogen attack. However various parameters like chicken breed, nutrition and rearing methods can impact the composition of the gut microbiota. Therefore, it is pertinent to establish the link between microbiota and poultry diseases. Formerly, the evaluation of microbiota in GIT was mainly based on culture-dependent methods, though, a great proportion of gut microbiota has not been cultured in vitro. Consequently, it was challenging to reveal the entire communities of the intestinal microbial population. With the advent of modern sequencing and bioinformatic tools, it is now possible to analyze the complex gut microbial communities associated with various species. The major goal of this project is to accomplish the broad characterization of gut microbial communities, in different breeds of Pakistani chickens by sequencing the V3-V4 region of the 16S rRNA gene. Moreover, identification of more resistant breeds and prevalent microbial signatures in conferring disease resistance has also been studied.