One-day old broilers exposed to amoxicillin. Gallus gallus

The objective of this study was to investigate the impact of short-term antibiotic treatment in early life on both early microbial colonization of the gut and functional development of intestinal tissue. From both control and antibiotic treated birds intestinal content samples were taken for microbiota analyzes and intestinal tissue samples were extracted for gene expression analyzes, both at three subsequent time-points (days 1, 5, and 14). Overall design: 1-day-old chicks (Cobb500) were housed in a floor pen system in which the chicks had ad libitum access to feed and water. At day 1, 2 groups were created; control and antibiotic treated (amoxicillin, 24h in drinking water). At days 1, 80 birds of the control group were sacrificed for tissue sampling. At days 5 and 14, per time-point 80 birds of the control group and 80 birds of the antibiotic treated group were sacrificed for tissue sampling. Subsequently, samples from these 80 birds were pooled in 8 pools of ten birds.