Microbial biomarkers for gain of weight on cattle

Here we performed the taxonomic identification of Bacterial and Archaeal communities from key compartments of the gastrointestinal tract of beef cows. We hypothesized that different gastrointestinal compartments (saliva, ruminal fluid, and feces) harbor unique microbial communities and every compartment could present biomarkers for nutrient utilization and efficiency. To test this hypothesis, we analyzed a set of 110 samples, all of them from animals from the same breed, submitted to the same food source, and collected at the same season. Our main target was to prospect microbial biomarkers for nutrient utilization and efficiency to reference future works.